Identifying Patterns of Coaching to Support the Implementation of the Good Behavior Game: The Role of Teacher Characteristics

Abstract There is growing interest in coaching to supportteacher implementation of evidence-based interventions;yet, there is limited research examining the tailoring ofcoaching support to teachers’ needs. This paper examinedcoaching dosage across one school year, and the relation-ship between coaching contacts and teacher baseline andend-of-year data. Data came from a randomized controlledtrial including 210 teachers in 18 schools implementing theGood Behavior Game (GBG), either as a stand alone orwhen integrated with a social–emotional learning curricu-lum. The overarching goal was to determine whethercoaches provided varying levels of teacher contacts andhow this support related to condition assignment, imple-mentation, and teachers’ beliefs and perceptions data.Growth mixture modeling (GMM) was used to examine thefrequency of teacher contacts across the school year. GMMindicated three distinct patterns: about 58 % of teachersreceived a moderate number of contacts; 27 % received aconsistently low number of contacts; and 15 % receivedhigh and increasing support. Teachers who received a highdegree of support were more often implementing the in-tegrated GBG and reported more negative beliefs and perceptions at the start of the school year than those in thelow contact class. Teachers in the low contact class im-plemented the least number of games and minutes of GBG,but reported better perceptions of organizational health andburnout, at the end of the year. Coaching dosage was un-related to observer ratings of implementation quality.

Citation: Pas ET, Bradshaw CP, Becker KD, Domitrovich C, Berg J, Musci R, Ialongo NS: Identifying patterns of coaching to support the implementation of the Good Behavior Game: The role of teacher characteristics. School Mental Health 2015, 7(1):61-73