Positive Reactions In Special Education

Positive compliments can even make whales dance. Compliments or any kind of positive reaction is a factor which encourages all creatures to have confidence. American educators from Rosenthal and Jacobson had an experiment in an elementary school in San Francisco. They conducted intelligence test on all students, then delivered a random list to the teachers regardless of test results, giving the false students’ grade information; they falsely informed the teachers that the students would improve their academic achievement outcomes because their intellectual abilities are higher than the average. The teachers responded with compliments and positive feedbacks with a sincere belief that the students on the list would surly improve their academic performance even higher.

There are four types of responses that we can show to students with disabilities: indifferent response, negative response, conversion response, and positive response. The most commonly used reactions would probably be indifferent and negative responses. However, what we should pay attention to is the conversion reaction and the positive reaction; use positive response to the well done instead of indifferent response, and use conversion method to the mistakes instead of negative response. The key points of the conversion reaction are to praise the process—as I mentioned above—, not to blame the results, and to express their constant trust and confidence in the others. If one goes to volunteer at the intellectual disabilities facilities, one can notice that every child likes different things. These synchronization or motivation factors are useful for inducing positive behaviors as reinforcement measures. I believe that it is more significant to praise the progress and send ongoing support than to computationally consider the relationship between reinforcement and