Behaviorism Vs. Constructivism

My case study Involves Lisa, a little girl who has problem working cooperatively in groups and becomes irate when she is not assigned the job she desires.
 
My primary behaviorist goal for Lisa would be to observe her working cooperatively with her peers in a cooperative learning group. My secondary goal would be to observe Lisa accepting and actively engaging in the job she was assigned, whether or not it was the one she desired.


Some Behaviorist techniques I might apply to change/condition Lisa's behaviors are as follows:



First approach: Positive reinforcement- every time I observe Lisa acting appropriately and cooperating in her group, reward her by presenting her with a reward or Negatively reinforce her behavior by taking away a regular assignment she finds unpleasant (ex. reward everyone in her group for working so well together by taking away their journal entry for the night.I'd be sure to notify Lisa that I appreciated her behavior, positively reinforce her specifically with a sticker or positive comment.)

Second approach: If reinforcing good behavior does not prove useful I would introduce removal punishment (I don't think presentation punishment would be, or ever is, appropriate of a useful tool for decreasing behavior). I would need to identify an external stimuli that served little to no educational purpose that Lisa was fond of and use its removal as an incentive to decrease her negative behaviors.

 

 I'm not very attracted to the Behaviorist viewpoint at all, in fact I find myself leaning toward a Constructivist teaching philosophy. I found this web page with some good suggestions about a constructivist approach to classroom management.

The model discussed by David Wees is the Restitution model of classroom management. In this model the teacher acts as a monitor of student behavior. The teacher establishes shared goals with the students, and serves as a source of feedback to help students build understandings of way certain behaviors are inappropriate. 

For this model, it is important to establish "base-line" rules, i.e. rules that are unacceptable for the student to break, which you must always respond to and apply appropriate consequences. This model allows students to make construct meaning from mistakes. 

To apply this to Lisa's in class behavior, I might sit down with Lisa at the beginning of the class to establish her "base-line" behavioral rules. I would continue to reinforce her good behavior, but when she broke one of the "base-line" rules, I would take her aside, discuss the situation with her. I think its important to try to identify what stimuli had influenced her actions and go over those factors with her. I would then try to help her understand why her behavior was unacceptable and negatively influenced both the classroom and Lisa herself.