Red and Green Choices

When I taught school age Autistic support our school used Green Irene's red and green choices behavior management system for one year.  You can check out her website with the above link.  I liked parts of the program but I did not embrace the entire program.  

Last year I worked with several preschools who had difficulty displaying appropriate behaviors.  I decided to try out a simplified version of the program.  We talked about red and green choices in one-on-one situation or in a group of two students.  

 

I laid out cards that were green or red.  I first discussed the red choices- or negative choices and then we discussed the green- or positive behaviors.  We sometimes acted out the green choices.  When I used this system as part of a school wide behavior system we were encouraged to also act out the negative behaviors.  Our behaviorists in the school made a video of both red and green choices.  After my students viewed the video, two of my students proceeded to act out many of the red behaviors throughout the school day.  I know that they simply wanted to show off and display attention seeking behaviors however I really was not on board with acting out the red choices.  I do not think that reenacting something that a student should not do is necessary, I think that practicing and modeling the positive behaviors is important.

I think asked students to decide which pockets the cards belonged in, the red or green pockets.  I wanted this to be a no-fail situation so the cards of course could be sorted by color.  If the preschool teachers were on board, I provided them with red cards that corresponded to the current negative behaviors displayed by the student and pictures of the requested/desired behaviors (green).  I suggested that the teachers have them handy so that they could approach the student when the desired behavior was seen and say something like "good job, Johnny, I like how you are_______" and then pair the verbal praise with the visual.  If they notice a negative behavior, the teacher can show the student the red card and say "I need you to stop" paired with the visual and then "This is what we should do" and pair it with the visual.

This strategy can be paired with a traffic light system.

This is a system that can be used individually or as a whole class.   Students often have their names or pictures attached to a clothespin that is hooked onto the traffic light.  Everyone starts out at the yellow light everyday.  They can move up or down depending on their positive or negative choices during the day.  Activities just as playtime, computer time, extra outdoor time, etc is tied to the traffic light.  I often made my traffic light with 3 green lights, 2 yellows, and 2 reds.  In some classrooms, teachers are hesitant to move students back to green once they have displayed inappropriate behaviors but that is important.  Students need to know that one mistake is not going to ruin an entire day.