Abstract
In recent years an impressive body of research has accumulated indicating that behavioural management strategies can promote the levels of on-task behaviour of classes of disruptive secondary school pupils. These successes have led to the explicit, self-evident claim that levels of off-task behaviour have concomitantly been reduced—and the implicit claim that levels of disruptive behaviour have also been reduced: for disruptive behaviour constitutes a subset of off-task behaviour. However the promotion of on-task behaviour with a corresponding reduction in off-task behaviour is a necessary but not sufficient outcome to claim that disruptive behaviour has diminished. It may be the case that innocuous off-task behaviours have been reduced but disruptive off-task behaviours remain. From a further data analysis of a previous study (McNamara and Jolly, 1990) it is claimed that when disruptive classroom behaviour is dealt with by the promotion of on-task behaviours the total amount of all types of off-task behaviours, from innocuous to grossly disruptive, is reduced. Analysis of data for individual pupils reveals that the whole class aggregated data conceal considerable inter-pupil variability for low incidence off-task behaviours.
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Disclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.