Challenging Behaviour Training for Teaching Staff and Family Carers of Children with Intellectual Disabilities: A Preliminary Evaluation

Training programs on the topic of challenging behaviors have often been offered to teaching staff and family carers of children with intellectual disabilities (ID). These efforts have been found to be effective in bringing about positive changes for both children with ID and those who support them. Generally, such training has been offered to either staff or family carers but not at the same time. The authors conducted a study to evaluate the efficacy of a brief training program delivered at the same time to teaching staff and family carers (who were involved with the same child). The study also examined differences in outcomes between the two groups, which were drawn from local schools where some children exhibited challenging behaviors. Both teaching staff and family carers completed the Checklist of Challenging Behaviour, the Challenging Behaviour Attributions Scale, and the Emotional Reactions to Challenging Behaviour Scale prior to, and following, the training workshops. The workshops were divided into two segments. The content was the same, but in the first segment, one was held for teaching staff and one for parent carers. In the second segment, both groups met together. After the first segment, all participants completed a related homework task before joining each other for the second segment. Training used a functional model of challenging behavior and facilitated the production of individualized support plans for the target children. Significant positive changes were found regarding ratings of challenging behavior, participants causal attributions, and emotional reactions following the training. Some differences were found regarding outcomes for teaching staff vs. family carers. The study showed that teaching staff and family carers can benefit from receiving combined training to support challenging behavior in children with ID.