Behaviour Intervention Planning
Critical Programming Needs: Explanation of Critical Component
Programming needs are different from child needs. In the background the team presents their understanding of the child's problem behaviours and what motivates or triggers the behaviours. From this perspective the team can begin to identify what the child needs in terms of programming. For example, a child may need to feel that s/he belongs. This would be a relevant programming need if s/he needs to belong to the school or classroom. The overall purpose of our Behaviour Intervention Plan may be to help the child have this experience. However, the specific needs that we are going to address in the program to make this possible are the programming needs. We may need to teach the child new social skills to help them socialize within the school community. We may also need to make some adaptations in the school and classroom environment to events that trigger, exacerbate, and maintain problem behaviours. We may even need to set some limits on the child's behaviours and develop strategies to help the child when s/he is unable to work within these limits.
Programming needs are based on our knowledge of what the school system and caregivers need, what the child needs to learn about prosocial behaviour, and what the child needs from us. Once we understand the function(s) of the child's problem behaviours the motivators, triggers, patterns, and needs of the child, we can begin to identify what programming needs must be addressed by the Behaviour Intervention Plan. There are three broad types of needs that a program must consider:
- System Needs
- Social-Learning Needs
- Personal/Emotional Needs
System Needs
System needs include what the caregivers need and what is needed from the child. For example, they may identify the school administration's bottom line for involvement in regular school activities. The school administrator may have a clear need for children to be safe in the school and for the classrooms to be positive learning environments for all children. Teachers and parents may have similar needs. If a child kicks and hits others on the playground (affecting safety) or threatens and belittles children in the classroom (affecting the learning environment), then interventions may need to be developed to address these concerns.
Staff working with a child who is extremely demanding and challenging may also have specific needs to be addressed. Teachers may need support during those times when the child is extremely "out of control" and planned interventions are ineffective. Teacher assistants may require backup support if a child becomes aggressive. Emergency Response Plans, or School Safety Plans may be required to insure that the staff, student and other students are reasonable safe. In some cases, clear agreements need to be established with parent(s) or guardian(s) as to how certain critical incidences will be handled and who will provide backup.
Caregivers such as parents may have specific needs related to the school or home. This Intervention Plan (unlike the coordinated multisystem plan) is primarily school focused. It is important that the parents have the opportunity to clearly state what they need from the school and that this is incorporated into the planning process. They may also wish to identify any needs for their home (the family system) and you may wish to include these here as a statement of System need.
Note that both the school and home needs may not be met immediately but they are the goals towards which the team aspires.
Team Thinking for Sample BIP 
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Social-Learning Needs
In this section teams identify what we want to teach the child socially. There are academic skills that we want to teach but these are addressed in the I.E.P. In this section we identify those personal and interpersonal skills that we believe would help the child to better cope with life. This often includes such things as prosocial skills training. Sometimes behaviour modification programs or interventions are used to teach alternate behaviour strategies. Cognitive behavioural interventions, counselling, or therapy is sometimes used to handle internal dynamics that drive problem behaviour. There are also informal day-to-day strategies to help the child deal with events that occur on the playground, on the way to or from school, and when dealing with authority. For many children, social learning is most effective when tied to actual day-to-day events rather than a social skills curriculum. Debriefing strategies such as "Life Space Intervention," are specifically designed for children with severe emotional/behavioural problems and can be quite effective as a social skills teaching tool.
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Personal/Emotional Needs
These are the most difficult needs for teams to identify. These are what the child needs from the caregivers in his or her school and/or home. These are the needs that we must address now if we are to help the child remain in the school, classroom, and/or placement. If these needs are not addressed, the child's survival strategies will continue to be triggered. When addressed, the child may be more open to learning those personal and interpersonal skills identified in the previous section.
Some people believe that children should be out of the school setting until they have learned "proper" behaviours and problem-solving strategies. However, this is usually based on the belief that there are places where these children can be "cured" or their behaviour corrected separate from the home and school environments. While behavioural correction is possible for many children, it may best be taught in the environment where the children live. Environments can support negative behaviour patterns. When we work with children in their natural living/learning environments, we tend to change the environment as well as the children. This allows for lasting success.
Working with children with behaviour problems is always a dual learning process. The children, through their behaviour, teach us which interventions are most effective and which are least effective. We teach the children new strategies for handling internal and external stressors. Some behaviours are genetically, biochemically, or organically based and remain with the children for a lifetime. It is the environment that needs to make reasonable changes to accommodate these children. Others have developed psychological and behavioural strategies to deal with severe trauma and extremely damaging life experiences. These children require some adjustment in their environment so that critical defences and survival strategies are not employed. Knowledge of the children's motivators, triggers, patterns, and needs help us to identify those programming needs that must be addressed for them to successfully survive within our school environment given their talents, weaknesses, needs, and survival strategies.
Personal/emotional needs are critical to the success of Behaviour Intervention Planning. However, they are only effective if they tied to our understanding of the child and the intent of his/her survival strategies.
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