Ecological considerations in the education and integration of young handicapped children

The paper focuses on how aspects of the physical and social environment can be analyzed and arranged within a training classroom to teach children with learning and behavior problems a variety of skills, and to promote generalization of these skills from the training classroom to an integrated classroom. The preliminary step in the teaching process should include identification and analysis of future environments in which the behavior to be trained should occur. This can be accomplished through such procedures as classroom observation and interviews with school personnel. The second step is the assessment of newly trained behaviors. For instance, the teacher should evaluate controlling social dimensions, such as the frequency of teacher instruction and praise required to maintain the behavior, and the physical factors, such as the number of distractions that can be present in a setting and yet not interfere with behavior. The final step consists of training a child to perform a set of skills under a variety of conditions. The training would be dictated by the results of the first and second steps.