Chapter 9- Behavorist Learning

How would you define successful mastery of your lesson objectives from a behavioral view of learning? Well, I think in any lesson the take away is for them to understand the content thoroughly and be able to apply it. For example, if I had a vocabularly lesson I do not want them to just take away the spelling and meaning of the word for which they can simply memorize. I want my students to apply what they know and create sentences to show they understand the words in different situations and contexts. In this instance I might propose rewards for mastery at the end of the unit to teach students delay of gratification and also give them something to work for. I hope to create an environment that has air of competition, but does not intimidate students where their response is to let the high learners win the prize. Consider your CSEL intervention case study. Are there tools from a behaviorist view for either encouraging productive behaviors or discouraging undesirable behaviors that you could apply to the case? What are they? I am not crazy about behavioristic approaches, but I think their are important and useful behavior techniques for the classroom in the form of reinforcement. In order to increase positive behaviors I may have a group goal available. In order to encourage students sitting in their seats, I will offer the reward of extra free time at the end of class. This will hopefully spark an interest since it is giving students the option to move around a lot at a later point. I will most likely use social reinforcers as well to discretely give praise while not giving too much attention to certain students. I might just smile often and give a thumbs up for good work, or a student that models good behavior, or I might even praise aloud in order to recognize, and feel as if he is really a star student.