Healthcare Training Institute - Quality Education since 1979
Psychologist, Social Worker, Counselor, & MFT!!

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Our primary intent for this Home Study Course is to provide you with quality education to foster professional growth. The Institute has provided quality education since 1979 to thousands nationally, and in Canada as well.

Welcome to the Home Study Course. My name is Tracy Catherine Appleton. We appreciate the fact that you have chosen us as a vehicle for you to earn your Continuing Education credits. A sub-title for this course might be "Behavior Modification revisited, and how to find the gem of an idea that will help you to grow professionally today."

The most efficient way to complete the Home Study Course is to complete it sequentially, module by module. By that, I mean after completing the introductory exercise in the course manual, listen to Module #1 first, "Positive Reinforcement - The P-R-I-D-E Method." Then complete the note-taking/fill-in-the-blank questions for that module. Then complete the brief-answer "Behavior Modification" questions for Module #1.

After this, listen to Module #2, "Instruction - Seven Basic Techniques." Complete the note-taking/ fill-in-the-blank questions and brief-answer "Behavior Modification" questions for the second module, and so on.

Since the materials are in a module format, the preceding system is a more efficient use of your time, as opposed to listening to all six modules at once, then answering all of the questions.

Speaking of efficiency, this brings us to time. How much time should this course take? If you find your time is running way over 10 hours, step back and rethink your process.

Who is the target student for this course? A wide variety of professions use Behavior Modification. For example, since the health professions are composed of both direct-care clinicians and administrative personnel, we have made a point to gear our Behavior Modification questions to learners who are in either of these positions. Thus, if you are a direct-service provider, you might recall a client, tenant, consumer, resident, patient, customer, etc., that you deal with. If you are in an administrative position, you might recall a staff member, team member, agency employee, etc., with which you work, to apply the concepts.

At this time, I would like to answer four questions that you might have:
Question #1: What is the importance of this material to me?
Question #2: What do the six modules contain?
Question #3: How does the module content interface with my course manuals?
Question #4: How will the content benefit me after the course is finished?

First, What is the importance of this material?, its importance lies in the fact that many times, unless you deal with certain populations, Behavior Modification techniques lie dead and buried in your college textbook course work that you took several years ago. You have been in the field now for a good while and have a well-established pattern of working with clients and/or staff members. You are a competent professional. So why dust off the Behavior Modification stuff, so to speak? Well, it's because it works and there are many valuable core concepts that can help you to work more effectively with your clients and staff members, even if they are not developmentally disabled, geriatric with dementia, or students. At the end of the course, you will be asked to set a goal as to how you plan to implement one of the concepts. Remember that "gem of an idea" I referred to in the introduction? So open your mind to hearing ideas you haven't heard in a while and be creative in looking for the gem that is really going to benefit you.

Secondly, What do the six modules contain? They contain a staff training program in Behavior Modification and review for you how these concepts can be applied. You will note the intent of each of the six modules are intended for training staff that are working with the geriatric population in an assisted-living community. Don't let the fact that this may not be the population with which you currently work side-track or prejudice you against the value of the information. Listen to the material with an ear for the parts that will apply to your day-to-day work. It is hoped that by being provided with these explicit examples of practical applications of Behavior Modification, you will be better able to apply them to your clients or staff members.

To further clarify the module content, here's an explanation of assisted living: Many people confuse assisted-living with long-term care. However, the continuum of care goes from home health, to an independent-living community, where a call-button is usually located in each apartment unit, to assisted-living, where care is provided for activities of daily living, such as bathing and dressing, to long-term care, where medications are administered, and finally to acute-care hospitalization.

Over the years, with the increased restrictions on Medicare and Medicaid coverage, there is a growing need for assisted-living communities to meet the needs of those who do not meet the long-term care criteria; however, are unable to live at home independently. The atmosphere of an assisted-living community is most generally non-medical. In most communities, one has the feeling of being in an apartment building for seniors that contains a front desk, lounge, and dining room.

Question #3, How does the content in the modules interface with my course manuals? Oftentimes, the care provider in the assisted-living setting does not have a medical background. As you will note, for this reason the modules do not use typical Behavior Modification terminology or jargon. For example, you will note that Module #3 is entitled "Demonstration: The Six Essential Steps." However, the Behavior Modification concept that is taught in this module is that of "modeling." However, if you tell the average person that they are going to be doing "modeling," the term may be misinterpreted as being connected with a display of fashion, thus leading to confusion and possible resistance to applying the information. SO the more descriptive term of "demonstration" is used for training purposes. For the same reason, in Module #2 entitled "Instruction: Seven Basic Techniques," the terms "shaping" and "successive approximations" are not used in the module.

Before answering Question #4, How will the content benefit me after the course is finished?, let me summarize the information you have received thus far: You have received a summary of the materials contained in this course, an overview of the question format, a method for most efficiently completing the course in ten hours, an explanation of the target student as being both clinician and administrator, an overview as to what the module's content is, an overview of assisted-living, and an explanation as to how the module's content interfaces with the course manuals.

I will now be spending the remainder of this Introduction answering Question #4, How will the content of this course benefit you after it's completed? As I answer this question as it relates to the content of each of the six modules, you will also receive a preview of the content for that module. First of all, as stated earlier, unless you work with children, students, the developmentally disabled, or dementia populations, for example, you may have lost touch with many of the Behavior Modification concepts you learned in undergrad and graduate school. The core purpose of this course is to reacquaint you with those procedures and hopefully have it act as a springboard into practical applications in your practice or agency. To use a Behavior Modification term, in other words, to "generalize" or to use these behaviors outside of the training situation. So, as stated earlier, listen to each module with a double-agenda, so to speak, by continually asking yourself "How can I apply these materials to my population, clients, or staff members?"

Here's a brief overview of a few concepts from each module, to give you food for thought as you listen to the modules:

In Module #1, "Positive Reinforcement - The P-R-I-D-E Method," if you are a clinician, as you already know, praise can be a double-edged sword in the fact that praise can start a client playing the "people-pleasing game," and turning more and more of their power over to the therapist. So as you listen to this information, see how this applies to you. However, if you are an administrator, the game of "pleasing the boss," so to speak, can be a powerful paradigm to improve employee performance. If you are utilizing the P-R-I-D-E Method described in the module, the staff members' formal evaluation could be used as the background for an agreement described in the course manual.

In Module #2, entitled "Instruction - Seven Basic Techniques," if you are an administrator, you might pay particular attention to this module's concepts of reinforcing intermediate responses. We all lead busy lives, and it is often easy to focus on the final response or action that you want from a staff member (or client, as far as that goes) without looking for some intermediate steps to reinforce.

Module #3, "Demonstration - The Six Essential Steps," encourages the clinician to revisit or examine their use of modeling by proposing graduated modeling procedures. For the administrator, the idea of managing by "wandering around" might be considered. For example, if you want employees to take more pride in their agency, you be the one who acts as the model and picks up the paper off the floor. For the role-playing concept presented in this module, if you have a receptionist who is timid about asking clients for payment, you might consider role-playing what to say and how to say it.

In Module #4, "Verbal Prompts - Using The Key Types Effectively," whether you are a clinician or administrator, pay attention to your use of questions, if you use open-ended, choice, or yes-and-no questions to their ultimate effectiveness. Many clinicians have spent years making an art out of weaving various types of questions into their sessions. However, if you are also involved in an administrative capacity, in the case, for example, of employee theft, an open-ended question like "What do you know about the missing items?" poses less threat than a yes-no question "Were you involved with the missing items?" So, if you are a clinician, you might use this module to fine-tune your skills in other areas of responsibility.

In Module #5, "Non-Verbal Prompts - Six How To's," whether a clinician or administrator, you might monitor your use of social reinforcers, like pats on the back, smiles, head nods, and so on, to assess fine-tuning these skills to help you most effectively accomplish your goals.

Module #6, "Motivation." For the clinician, you might consider an extinction technique often overlooked. As you see clients this week, ask yourself "Is there some type of reinforcer that can be removed to help my client succeed?" The same is true with an administrator. If you have a staff member that is not performing up to par, ask yourself "Is there something in my behavior that is reinforcing their poor performance?"

Well, there you have it. Food for thought as you listen to each of the six modules.