Contributions from: K. Richard Young - USA, Richard P. West - USA and Jill Morgan - USA.
Abstract
Self-management programs typically involve some combination of two or more of the following strategies: self-monitoring, self-evaluation, and positive reinforcement. A successful program combines the strategies to teach students responsibility for their own social behaviour and academic performance (Young, West, Li and Peterson, 1998). Researchers and practitioners have cited a number of benefits and rationales for teaching students to self-manage in general and special education settings, including: (a) increasing students' self-reliance, (b) decreasing students' over-reliance on parents, caretakers, teachers and external controls, and (c) permitting teachers to spend less time on classroom management and more time on instructional tasks (McDougall, 1998). This symposium comprises papers on the following topics: 1. A brief overview of the research on self-management, its flexibility and effectiveness with diverse populations. 2. How to teach students to self-manage their behaviour and how to make sure these skills generalise to other classes and settings. 3. The Clocklight procedure and the PAL Game - classwide self-management programs designed to promote the inclusion of diverse students. 4. The WATCH procedure - a self-management program for improving academic skills. Richard Young will lead an interactive audience/panel discussion addressing questions and concerns from the audience as well as discussing future directions for research and implications for practitioners.
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