On Behavior In The Classroom

Is it possible for Child-Centered Play Therapy (CCPT) to be successful with students referred for a variety of highly disruptive behaviors in a high poverty school? Researchers began to look into this question by reviewing studies that specifically looked at underprivileged students being quickly pulled away from a successful life in school and toward a lifetime in prison. Specifically, Cochran and Cochran cited the Children’s Defense Fund (2007) mentioning that the problem goes beyond schools citing the cradle-to-prison pipeline where: So many poor babies in rich America enter the world with multiple strikes already against them, including a lack of access to health and mental health care; child abuse and neglect;

Lack of quality early childhood education to get ready for school; educational disadvantages resulting from failing schools that do not expect or help them achieve or detect and correct early problems that impede learning [making] a successful transition to productive adulthood significantly less likely and involvement in the criminal justice system significantly more likely.

The future appears to be bleak for these children in poverty, especially the research group in question with highly disruptive behaviors.

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These children are immediately faced with difficult choices that often lead to a decision in a negative direction. The implications that these children were born into a life of prison because of their high-poverty background are hard to swallow.

Researchers were able to cite several articles referencing how high-poverty can lead to disruptive behaviors and eventually prison. For the purpose of the study, Cochran and Cochran (2017) defined highly disruptive behavior as behavior causing “significant and persistent interference with one’s own and peers’ learning and instruction, through frequent aggression towards peers or teachers and/or noisiness and frequent refusal or failure to follow directions.

The purpose of this study was to specifically test the effects of CCPT with high-risk students that had not shown improvement with many different behavior interventions. Researchers were sought out by administrators of a school that were worried that even their youngest students were not making progress in a large variety of pull-out interventions, including parent programs, teacher support, mentoring, time with the school counselor, and alternative discipline.

These students were already headed towards the negative decisions in life at a very early age. Participants were chosen due to their referrals for “highly disruptive behavior.” Some examples of this behavior in the classroom setting include aggression towards others, inattention, noisiness, and refusal to complete work or follow directions. The selection process began with administration referrals and followed with parent consent for services, research, and videoed supervision. After a variety of variables preventing study participation for several students, researchers ended up with 65 significantly disruptive students. “Children were of elementary school years (K-5), with 52% from, kindergarten to second grade and 47.6% from third to fifth grade”.

Further study demographics show that the average age of students was seven years old, where half were described as Caucasian and the other half fell into three minority categories, specifically, African-American, Hispanic, and Native American. The large majority of the students were male (76.9%). All students involved in the study attended one of five schools; three of the schools were classified as urban and located in the southeastern USA while the other two were located in the northeastern USA. “All schools were considered high poverty, having free or reduced lunch rates above 90%”. Students in the study were seen at either one of the five schools or at an afterschool program of one of the southeastern schools. Teachers of the students were given two different instruments of measure for rating the behavior of their students.

Specifically, they rated behaviors on the Teacher’s Report form of the Child-Behavior Checklist and the Self-Efficacy Scale for Children - Teacher Version. Researchers included the self-efficacy scale as a “precursor to grade change and because the SES relates directly to the natural school goal of motivation to learn”. I believe that the researchers were hypothesizing that these students, born into a life of poverty, were not motivated to learn but rather motivated by a drive to survive due to a live in poverty and the fact that their most basic needs were not being met. One of the critiques of the study is my difficulty in understanding their treatment assignment and waiting period comparison groups.

It appears that they initially planned on the experimental and controlled groups being equal; however, they ran into a problem where students “could not wait” to be paired up. Because of this, researchers had an uneven number of students in the experimental and control groups. Participants and their families also received non-counseling related services outside of the research group. If involved in outside mental health agencies for counseling, they were asked to terminate that relationship for the duration of the study; however, they were able to receive school counseling services within the school setting. Parents received food bags from community agencies and also were connected to agencies that could assist with other referral related issues.

Students participated in CCPT sessions for 30 minutes two times a week. Administrators found it easier for schools to accommodate the abbreviated sessions occurring on a more frequent basis. These sessions took place in special areas set up in the school setting, were specifically set up to practice play therapy, and included “developmentally, culturally, and symbolically representative toys that remained consistent and were specifically chosen to enable multiple modes of expression and the needs of the each stage of CCPT”. Also, it is worth noting that sessions were a full 30 minutes. Researchers used additional time for walking students to and from class as well as clean up after session.

While the methodology of the study was a bit confusing at times, their findings were clear in that there was a statistical and clinical significance of the present findings showed a positive impact of CCPT for highly disruptive behavior. Researchers found the time students spent participating in therapy provided consistency for the students and allowed both the students and the school counselor to use the time to focus on the growth of the therapeutic relationship. Some limitations of the study include nonrandom assignment and biased teacher rating scales. While researchers attempted to have a random assignment, the issue of “he needs therapy right now” caused the group to be more focused in getting certain students the help they needed quickly rather than waiting their turn.

Also, when the rating scale is not blinded and involves human emotion, teachers may not be honest due to a variety of different reasons. Specifically, teachers may rate on a more positive rating scale to show improvement or productivity or the opposite, to show a lack of improvement or productivity. In conclusion, researchers stated that “too often, highly troubled children who live in poverty fall through the gaps in the safety net of existing school and social services”. These gaps are what cause conflict with in the school in meeting the needs of the student. The findings showed that CCPT “can make a significant, powerful, and practical difference in the lives of school successes of children in great need of … care and effective outreach”.