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Room management and target‐setting in a classroom for pupils with severe mental handicaps
Author(s) -
Pope Catherine
Publication year - 1988
Publication title -
mental handicap research
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.056
H-Index - 63
eISSN - 1468-3148
pISSN - 0952-9608
DOI - 10.1111/j.1468-3148.1988.tb00072.x
Subject(s) - psychology , pupil , set (abstract data type) , control (management) , quality (philosophy) , medical education , medicine , computer science , philosophy , epistemology , artificial intelligence , neuroscience , programming language
Room management has been developed and researched in an attempt to improve aspects of the quality of life of children and adults with mental handicaps. The effect of this procedure was evaluated in a classroom for pupils with severe mental handicaps. Following a baseline, the system was implemented with eight pupils and monitored for five weeks. Subsequently, the additional component of interest, weekly target‐setting, was included for half the group for a further five weeks. The progress of each of the eight pupils on target skills and “control” target skills was assessed, and the results were compared. The rate of skill acquisition by pupils for whom targets were set did not differ significantly from that of the control pupils. The target‐setting procedure did not have an adverse effect on pupil or staff behaviour within the room management procedure. The implications of including a teaching element within the room manager role are discussed.