Starting Early: Developing School-Wide Behavior Support in a Community Preschool.

Abstract: An example of school-wide behavior support applied in an inclusive community preschool program is presented in this article. The authors provide a description of their collaboration in developing a systemic model of behavior support that included universal prevention elements and individual intensive support systems. Each element of school-wide behavior support is described, emphasizing how it is implemented with young children.

EDITORS' NOTE: The Forum section of the Journal of Positive Behavior Interventions is presented to encourage communication among readers and provide for an exchange of opinions, perspectives, ideas, and informative personal accounts. We welcome brief articles from family members, professionals, friends, advocates, administrators, researchers, and other individuals who are concerned with behavioral support issues. The purpose of the Forum is to facilitate a constructive dialogue among our many stakeholders regarding important issues in practice, research, training, program development, and policy. Submissions to the Forum undergo an expedited review and may be submitted to either editor.

In the Fall 2000 issue of the Journal of Positive Behavior Interventions (JPBI 2:4), seven key themes regarding the implementation of school-wide behavior support were presented (Horner & Sugai, 2000). As we are currently in the third year of collaboration to integrate school-wide behavior support within an inclusive community early childhood program, we read those articles with great interest. Our experiences have been similar to those presented in that issue of JPBI, although important and distinctive differences exist when school-wide positive behavior support (PBS) is implemented within a private community preschool setting due to both the setting and the developmental ages of the children. In this article, we discuss the differences and commonalities by describing our collaborative efforts in developing a school-wide behavior support model for young children.

The Context of Collaboration

Our collaboration began in an effort to ensure that Palma Ceia Presbyterian Preschool was able to meet the diverse needs of all children enrolled in their community early childhood program. The collaboration was initiated by the second author, who is the director of the preschool. She had identified behavior management as a needed area of program improvement and contacted the first author, who is a university researcher in PBS, about a possible collaboration. Palma Ceia Presbyterian Preschool has a 20-year history of providing a high-quality, inclusive early childhood program to young children--with and without developmental disabilities. The school …