In the past decade, elementary school settings have been overwhelmed by increasing numbers of behaviorally at-risk children who are unresponsive to the minimal but necessary demands of schooling. It is of critical importance to get behaviorally at-risk children off this trajectory or pathway as soon as possible in their school careers through early, coordinated interventions that are delivered via collaborative partnership arrangements between child behavior experts, parents, school staff, and peers. The proposed project will address this continuing need by developing training materials to facilitate the dissemination of the evidence- based First Step to Success (FSS;Walker, Kavanagh, Stiller, Golly, Severson, and Feil, 1997) intervention that is designed to achieve secondary prevention goals and outcomes for behaviorally at-risk children in grades K-3. The FSS is a selected early intervention approach that is appropriate for children who experience moderate-to- severe behavior problems in the beginning stages of their school careers. The overall aim of the proposed project is to develop an interactive multimedia training program for effectively implementing the FSS intervention. The Phase I project will produce an interactive prototype DVD- ROM (Alpha version) for training coaches to conduct the FSS intervention in schools, and work with students, teachers, and parents to carry out the program. A subset of FSS concepts and skills will be presented in the prototype using a variety of methods including video, text, animated graphics, audio narration, and interactive programming. We will solicit feedback about the program design and components in focus groups with school professionals (e.g., psychologists, counselors, teaching assistants, social workers). The prototype DVD-ROM training program will be assessed for general usability, consumer satisfaction, knowledge gained, and self- efficacy regarding FSS implementation by evaluating its use with 40 school professionals. Public Health Relevance: Challenging behavior patterns severely stress the classroom management skills of teachers, disrupt peer relations, lead to social isolation and affiliation with deviant peer groups, and are increasingly being seen in younger children. It is critically important to implement early intervention programs with children who are developing behavior problems rather than intervening after aberrant patterns are well-established and more difficult to remediate. The proposed development of a computer-based interactive program designed to train behavioral coaches will provide a standardized and high-quality training that is delivered in a cost-effective and accessible manner. The proposed program will fulfill a strong demand for training in the implementation of the First Step to Success early intervention program.
