Development of an Observation System to Measure Narratives of Teaching Interactions

• Main Author: Hines, Dalai C
• Other Authors: Ala'i-Rosales, Shahla
• Format: Others
• Language: English
• Published: University of North Texas 2018
• Subjects: narratives; teaching interaction; staff training; Autistic children > Education
• Online Access: https://digital.library.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc1404564/

Having a measurable way to analyze how staff members describe teaching interactions is important for staff training and building a community of effective and caring practice. The purpose of this project, part of a larger program, is to develop a measurement system that captures descriptions of connected events (narratives) during teaching interactions. This project involved development of a reliable measurement system that discriminates between experienced and novice narratives of teaching interactions (contingency arrangements) across multiple cases of instruction. The participants were employees of a non-profit agency serving children with autism and their families. They volunteered to participate in the study. The development of the code included the systematic selection of high quality autism intervention video clips and asking participants to view the clips and describe events, and then coding responses. The participant narratives were then categorized by themes and analyzed. The results are described in the context of usefulness and limitations of the measurement systems. A mutielement design comparing responses across stimulus conditions was used to evaluate the sensitivity of the measurement system in discriminating between novice and experienced interventionists.