Mini Training Series Ep: 15 Can't do or Won't do

Hi, this is Sasha from The Autism Helper, and in this episode of the mini video training series, I'm going to talk about approaching student struggles and problem behaviors as a can't do or won't do. So you've probably heard me talk about this before because I'm kind of obsessed with viewing issues that students are having through this lens because it helps me start the process of identifying the function or reason why a behavior is occurring. Remember, every behavior has a reason. So we want to start that process of figuring out what's going on and not just relying on a quick assumption. So the can't do or won't do is approaching a problem and asking yourself, can the student not do the skill, or does the student not want to do the skill? So the can't do is an issue of skill deficit. The student doesn't have the skills required to perform the task. And I don't mean just academics here. There's a lot of skills required in requesting help. There's a lot of skills required in transitioning between centers. There's a lot of skills required in giving back the iPad when your turn is over. So it could be an issue of skill deficit. The won't do is the issue of motivation. The reinforcer isn't there. And let's be real, everything is about the reinforcer. The reinforcer is the why. And when people tell me, "Oh, I don't use reinforcers." I don't believe in that. They're misunderstanding what reinforcement means because all behavior that continues is followed by some form of reinforcement. It's why we keep engaging in behaviors because we're getting something out of it. So you want to look at that motivation and see if the right motivation is there or not because it could be a situation where the student's not receiving any reinforcement for the behavior. So why are they gonna continue doing it? Or they're receiving some reinforcement for that negative behavior. So we want to identify that there. So I like to use this can't do, won't do kind of frame of mind and think about my own behavior. I give this example a lot in trainings. So I am not a runner. I do not like running. I kind of wish I liked running, but I don't like running. If someone asked me to run a mile, I could do that. I don't want to though. So it would be an issue of won't do. Someone's like, "Hey Sasha, come outside with me and run a mile real quick." I'm like, "No thanks, not interested. I'll stay right here. No thanks." But if they say, "Hey, can you run a mile with me? And then after you run a mile with me, I'll buy you a new pair of shoes." Well, suddenly the reinforcement is there. So I'm gonna be like, "Cool, I've got the skills and now I have the motivation, so I'm gonna do it." But let's say someone says, "Hey, let's go run a mile, and can you run a mile in under 5 minutes?" No, I don't have the skills to run a mile in under 5 minutes. No matter what motivation you added or what reinforcement you added, I still couldn't do it. You were like, hey, let's go run a mile in under 5 minutes, and if you do it, I'll give you a million dollars. I mean, you better believe I'm gonna try, but I wouldn't be able to accomplish that because I don't have the skills there. So in that situation, it would be a can't do and a skill deficit issue. So you probably know your students pretty well and have a good idea of if this is a can't do or a won't do problem, but I encourage you to push past your casual observations or your assumptions because a lot of times we're wrong. And I've found that with me especially, I'm not always willing to be wrong. So if you're in that category of kind of being stuck in your ways or thinking you know the right way, be willing to be open to new ideas and go beyond that quick assumption of what's going on. Because if you've made a quick assumption and you've tried to change the situation and you're not having success, you're probably incorrect in that assumption. And the strategies that you utilized were then incorrect. So be willing to be wrong. It's okay to be wrong. No one has to know. Can between— be between me and you. Or just yourself. So be willing to get deeper to figure out if it's a can't do or won't do. So two situations that I've seen recently where this was an incorrect assumption on if it was a can't do or won't do. One was with students transitioning between centers. So it's a first grade classroom, they've done centers every day for the whole year, we're midway through the year and students are still struggling to transition between centers. Students are staying too long in one center, they're not going to the correct next center, it's taking way longer than it should have, and the teacher really thought that it was a motivation issue. She's like, "You know what, I think our centers are getting stale. I think, you know, there's not enough incentive to complete the task to the next center, or the reinforcement is laying at the center the students are staying at, so they don't want to go to the next one." So she followed that assumption and she tried a bunch of things. She added in some token economies, she switched up the centers, she switched up the groups, she let kids pick and choose, and kids were still struggling to transition between centers. So that assumption was wrong of it being a motivation issue. And when we looked closer and we did some observations and took some anecdotal notes and took some data, and then we did the test, the that I'll talk about in a few minutes, we realized it was a skill deficit issue. The teacher had done some pretty great direct instruction on how to switch between centers at the start of the year, but it's midway through the year and you know everyone forgets everything they did in August and September. So students were not clear on when they were supposed to switch. Students weren't clear if they were allowed to talk or not talk, if the talk could be quiet or loud. They were unclear if they could run or not, or if they could walk, because sometimes they ran and it was fun fine. They were also unclear on where centers were because centers were moved around a lot. So it was a skill deficit issue. After she spent some time teaching the cues of when you have to switch, teaching the expected behaviors that students should engage in during the transition, and really clarifying the route kids took between centers by adding visuals and adding other cues, suddenly kids were transitioning between centers in a quarter of the time. It was at like 4 or 5 minutes to transition to 30 seconds. So super fast. So in that situation, doing a different intervention had a really, really big impact. When we were doing the wrong one, it's because we had the wrong reason. Another situation might be with a student that is given math work, and you give a math worksheet— students, let's say, in inclusion, in their gen ed class— and they try to do the math work and they are struggling. They are talking to peers, They are getting up and walking around. They are clumping paper in the desk and playing with their pencil, doing all of those fun off-task behaviors that you and I know and love. And the teacher might assume, "Oh, you know what? This math work is just too hard for this student, so I'm gonna give them something easier." Well, that assumption was incorrect. That child actually does that math work all the time in the special ed resource room. That same exact type of math work. But in the special ed resource room, the teacher there uses a token economy, and the child knows that if she starts her worksheet right away and she has that great sustained attention and finishes the end of the activity, stays on task until the end, she will get 2 tokens. And when she gets 2 tokens, she knows all the great things that are in that reinforcer bin. And in the gen ed, there isn't a token economy, there isn't a great system of reinforcement, Maybe last week she did do the worksheet perfectly and she sat there like kind of waiting for the round of applause and nothing happened. She got no praise, no reinforcer. She's like, "What's the point? I guess I'm just gonna do other things because I'm not getting anything out of doing this." So the issue there was a won't do. It was an issue of motivation. So I hope these two scenarios kind of highlighted how our assumptions can be wrong, and if our assumptions are wrong, we might engage in interventions that are ineffective. We want to pick, obviously, interventions that are effective. So I teased this a few minutes ago. What is the test you can do to find out if it's a can't do or won't do? No, I don't sell a magic wand that will instantly tell you what to do, or some super secret number you can text and it'll just do a reply back of can't do or won't do. No, you got to do a little bit of work. But there's kind of an— I'm gonna give a brief summary of a general way to do a quick little test to see if this is a can't do or won't do, and I'm gonna use my Center transition example. So what you can do is first take some baseline data. So before you try anything new, figure out where you're at. Figure out how many questions you're getting correct. Figure out how many prompts the student needs. Figure out how long the activity takes. So in the center rotation example, we did some baseline data and figured out how long those center rotations took. And like I said, they took 4 to 5 minutes, which was a lot longer than we wanted because there were a lot of centers, so that was eating up a lot of time. So first we got that baseline data, then we offered a high-ticket reinforcer. So come out with the big guns, something that's novel, something that's new, something that you don't use all the time. So we told students like, hey, if we can transition throughout all the centers really quickly this morning, before lunch we're gonna watch a movie. And this classroom never watched movies, so this was a big deal. So offer that big-ticket item and Then take data again. So you want to take data again to see if that high-powered reinforcer is going to affect the behavior. Does the rate of the behavior change? Do the amount of prompts need to go down? Does the time needed to complete the task go down? Does the accuracy go up? Like, "Oh, suddenly when there's a reinforcer, I can get this all done." So in the case of the center transition example, we offer that high-ticket reinforcer, the watching the movie, and the numbers didn't really change. It was still about the same. And then we knew it was that skill deficit issue, that even when we offered that big-ticket reinforcer, it still wasn't giving those kids the skill. The reinforcer doesn't teach a skill, but it can increase a behavior that's already there. Well, for this class, those behaviors weren't there. Like I had explained, they needed some direct instruction on exactly how to complete that transition between centers. So once we knew, okay, the numbers didn't change, we have a good feeling it's gonna be a can't do, we implemented some skill instruction, and then we saw the time to transition really go down. So I love this little saying of can't do or won't do because I think it's an easy way to teach your brain to always think about the why, and that the why could be a lack of skills or it could be a lack of motivation. So next time you're in your classroom, or if you're a parent that you're home and you feel frustrated— because when students are struggling or when there's problem behaviors, yes, we feel frustrated because we want our students to excel and do well. It's not even in a selfish way. But when you start feel that coming on, think, is this a can't do or a won't do? And this will give you a little bit of pause to start to investigate like I explained, using that quick little test and taking that baseline data and comparing it a few days later, it will start to give you that information of if the problem is a can't do or if the problem is a won't do. Once you have that information, you will know the best way to respond and you will be on the right path. You won't be engaging in interventions that aren't helpful and maybe you're just wasting time. This is gonna give you that direction that you need. So next time there's a problem behavior that pops up, don't react right away. Ask yourself, is this a can't do or won't do?