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B6InterteachingAstrategyforenhancingtheuserfriendlinessofbehavioralarrangementsinthecollegeclassroom.pdf
The Behavior Analyst 2002, 25, 215-226 No. 2 (Fall)
Interteaching: A Strategy for Enhancing the User-Friendliness of Behavioral Arrangements in
the College Classroom Thomas E. Boyce
University of Nevada, Reno Philip N. Hineline Temple University
"Interteaching" is an arrangement for college classroom instruction that departs from the standard lecture format and offers an answer to criticisms commonly directed at behavioral teaching tech- niques. This approach evolved from exploratory use of small-group arrangements and Ferster and Perrott's (1968) "interview technique," leading ultimately to a format that is organized around focused dyadic discussion. Specific suggestions are offered that might enable both seasoned and novice instructors to incorporate this or similar arrangements into their classrooms. This approach retains some key characteristics of Keller's personalized system of instruction and precision teach- ing, but offers greater flexibility for strategies that are based on behavioral principles. Key words: applied behavior analysis, education, instruction, interviewing, PSI, precision teach-
ing, reciprocal peer tutoring
This article describes a strategy for applying, in flexible and innovative ways, a technology of classroom in- struction based on the principles of be- havior analysis. The techniques de- scribed have been informally evaluated in the classroom instruction of the au- thors, and several features of this ap- proach are shared with various alter- native forms used by other behavioral scientists committed to using the prin- ciples of behavior in their own class- room arrangements. Because it is im- portant to empirically validate the claims made, including their effective- ness at producing behavior change in criterion environments, we offer this paper as a starting point for research and as a guide for instructors who seek alternative classroom arrangements to enhance their own teaching repertoires. To introduce the reader to the tech-
niques of interteaching, we first offer some background rationale and de-
Correspondence conceming this article should be addressed to Thomas E. Boyce, Department of Psychology/296, University of Nevada-Reno, Reno, Nevada 89557 (e-mail: [email protected]) or Philip N. Hineline, Department of Psychology, Temple University, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19122 (e-mail: [email protected]).
scribe how previous attempts to apply the principles of behavior in the class- room (i.e., personalized systems of in- struction and precision teaching) have attempted to facilitate learning. Next, we identify sources of resistance to these more traditional behavioral ap- proaches and introduce interteaching as a strategy for overcoming this resis- tance. Then, we describe in detail the key components of interteaching in hopes of encouraging readers to try some or all of these techniques in their own classrooms, perhaps using them as bases for their own innovations or for research comparing this to other ap- proaches.
USING PRINCIPLES OF BEHAVIOR ANALYSIS IN
THE CLASSROOM
For a behavior analyst, learning is something a person does, not some- thing that happens to him or her. More specifically, no matter what arrange- ment or experience is said to produce learning, what students have learned is what they can do afterward that they could not do before. Thus, Catania (1998) characterizes learning as "the
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216 THOMAS E. BOYCE & PHILIP N. HINELINE
process by which behavior is added to an organism's repertoire; a relatively permanent change in behavior" (p. 395). It follows that a behavior analyst will view teaching as the facilitating of such changes, not as merely the dis- pensing of information. From this viewpoint, the standard
university format of lectures and mid- term and final exams is recognized as a design that will generate inferior per- formance or even failure among many students. Because they rely heavily on students' self-management skills that are maintained weakly, if at all, by long-term contingencies, traditional ar- rangements ensure that most studying will be concentrated within two or three 48-hr periods of a 3- or 4-month academic term. Furthermore, the stan- dard format places most students in the role of spectators, for even if a skilled teacher encourages student participa- tion in a lecture-discussion format, time constraints and social contingen- cies will result in active participation by only a small proportion of students. Moreover, lectures imply that the stu- dents in a class can progress in unison. However, no matter how a teacher pac- es a lecture, it will always be moving too fast for some and not quickly enough for others. It follows that for both students who cannot keep up and those who work ahead, coming to class is minimally reinforced or even pun- ished. Basic principles of behavior pre- dict that attendance will be problematic unless additional, typically punitive ar- rangements favor it. Adding frequent quizzes, perhaps without advance warning, will improve the performance and attendance of some students, but this can detract from the teacher-stu- dent relationship while making the in- structional setting aversive.
Behavior analysts should be able to do better than that. As Keller (1968) proposed, we can generate improved changes in students' performances by arranging "a reinforcing state of affairs for everyone involved [students and in- structor alike]" through a "sober anal- ysis of the critical contingencies in op-
eration" (p 86). Such arrangements can produce durable enhancements of rep- ertoires-which is to say, robust learn- ing-without the aversiveness of un- predictable evaluations or other puni- tive arrangements. With his personal- ized system of instruction (PSI), Keller demonstrated that a behavior-analytic approach to teaching could be incor- porated into a classroom environment and used with success.
Keller's PSI format emphasizes stu- dent participation and does not rely on lectures. It arranges for students' self- pacing as they master small selections of material specified on worksheets or lists of "study objectives." Students must demonstrate their readiness to progress to new material by taking fre- quent tests that also provide access to "motivational" lectures (thus posi- tioned as reinforcers rather than as an- tecedent events). If a test indicates that the student has not yet mastered the current material, no penalty results oth- er than the necessity of retaking the test until mastery has been achieved. Furthermore, instead of a focus on rote memorization of definitions and facts, students are encouraged to integrate definitions when describing examples that illustrate behavioral principles in action. Proctors and tutors supply am- ple feedback during in-class time, which often functions as a study ses- sion. After having taken the course, thus having mastered the material, stu- dents can in turn receive additional course credit and strengthen and fine- tune their repertoires by serving as proctors or tutors.
There have been a few systematic demonstrations of the effectiveness of the PSI format (for a review and meta- analysis of such studies, see Kulik, Ku- lik, & Cohen, 1979). Notable among these is Born, Gledhill, and Davis' (1972) direct comparison of PSI with traditional formats. Born et al. assessed student performance in a traditional lecture course, a PSI course, a modified PSI course (in which students selected the size of units for successive mas- tery), and a course that alternated be-
INTERTEACHING 217
tween PSI and the lecture format. All courses were based on the same text materials. So as not to be biased against the traditional alternative, per- formances were measured by midterm and final examinations. It was found that students in the PSI and modified PSI courses scored higher on all types of test items, and in particular, on items requiring written responses.
In contrast, if one teaches mainly by lecturing and emphasizes stand-alone definitions, students will learn to take notes and recite definitions, assisted only by an arrangement in which there is little to do but read and listen. It is not surprising that a Keller course that emphasizes flexible repertoires of writ- ing produces more adequate written re- sponses than those that commonly re- sult from a lecture course. These find- ings demonstrate the importance of de- veloping repertoires foundational to effective behavior in later courses, in graduate school, and ultimately in ca- reers. Although the method is uncon- ventional, its effects are consistent with traditionally stated goals. For example, the student who is able to understand concepts, define and appropriately ap- ply terms, speak a second language, play a musical instrument or a new piece of music after instruction, has learned. Thus, by any standard, in reg- istering for a class a student is con- tracting with the teacher to facilitate these changes. PSI is a method of in- struction by which the instructor's end of the contract seems more likely to be fulfilled.
Nevertheless, despite its reported ef- fectiveness, PSI has not been widely adopted, possibly because it requires fairly elaborate administrative arrange- ments (Pear & Crone-Todd, 1999). In addition, it is difficult for administra- tors in that PSI courses often produce grade lists with high numbers of both As and incomplete. The resulting bi- modal distribution, unlike the tradition- al bell curve expected in large-enroll- ment courses, leads administrators and colleagues to suspect both grade infla- tion and inefficient course administra-
tion, even though the actual conduct of the course ensures quality control that exceeds the usual norms. Even taking only the instructor's personal concerns into account, a properly run PSI course requires extensive advance preparation of instructional materials, coaching of proctors, and other administrative ar- rangements. Thus, despite evidence in- dicating the success of methods such as PSI, the lecture format combined with midterm and final exams remains the typical pattern of instruction in col- lege undergraduate courses (Machado & Silva, 1998).
Another cluster of behavior-analytic educational techniques has evolved un- der the label of "precision teaching" (PT) (Lindsley, 1964). PT emphasizes direct measurement of rate of respond- ing, which enables a specification of "fluency," which is said to be the fluid combination of accuracy and speed that defines competent performance, or "true mastery" (Binder, 1996). Thus defined, fluent performance entails more than mere accuracy. It also in- volves practice leading to high rates of responding that enable a student (a) to remember a skill, (b) to respond in the face of distractions and over long pe- riods of time, and (c) to apply the skill to more complex problems. A key component of PT is timed
practice, whereby complex behaviors are broken down into simpler compo- nent skills. As applied to college in- struction, these skills include defining and applying new terms appropriately. Each of these is practiced until it oc- curs rapidly as well as accurately; only then is the next component introduced. Students' progress is carefully moni- tored on standard celeration charts (Pennypacker, Koenig, & Lindsley, 1972), which allow a teacher to make data-based decisions regarding meth- ods of instruction and adjustments of curriculum. Finally, each student pro- gresses at his or her own pace. The ob- jective is stability and reliability of per- formance that should be a desired out- come for any learning arrangement, including those of the college class-
218 THOMAS E. BOYCE & PHILIP N. HINELINE
room. PT shares several features with PSI, and its effectiveness for adult lit- eracy training has been demonstrated among college students at Malcolm X College and for teaching basic skills to younger individuals at the Morningside Academy (Johnson & Layng, 1992). Also like PSI, however, PT methods have not been widely adopted.
Sources of Resistance to Alternative Approaches
Although few people openly dispute the effectiveness of PSI and PT, these techniques have been ignored by most educators. It appears to be assumed that, at any educational level, the suc- cess of "alternative education pro- grams" is attributable mainly to en- hanced personal attention, implying smaller classrooms and smaller teach- er-student ratios whose economic in- efficiency detracts from their pedagog- ical effectiveness. At the college or university level, both teachers and ad- ministrators seem to assume that tech- niques for individualized instruction are unsuited for large classrooms full of students, and perhaps are applicable only for narrowly defined topics of study. Thus, as McMichael and Corey (1969) asserted, if behavior-analytic techniques of teaching are to be widely adopted, it will be necessary to dem- onstrate more than their superior re- sults compared to lecture methods. It will also be necessary to show them to be applicable to general subject mat- ter-that is, not just to psychology courses, and especially, not limited to courses in learning or behavior analy- sis. In this context, it is worth noting that in McMichael and Corey's study, students not only performed better on conventional examinations when learn- ing via PSI than via lecture; they also rated the course more favorably. This indicates that, from the students' per- spective, contingency-management methods are readily acceptable. Nev- ertheless, it is the instructors' choices that determine and configure a teaching arrangement.
Most teachers at the college level have long histories of constructing courses that emphasize lectures and of evaluating students' work via midterm and final examinations. Most likely this is how they themselves learned and how their peers arrange their own courses. There is little reason to do oth- erwise if one persists in the tradition of viewing education as the imparting of knowledge rather than as the teaching of skills. However, a consideration of the principles of behavior analysis sug- gests that we examine the relations be- tween instructors' and students' behav- ior that occur within the course and the repertoires or skills that the course is supposed to generate. If one takes se- riously the acquisition of new skills and repertoires as the primary agenda of a college course, then the shortcom- ings of conventional formats become obvious and more compelling.
But many behavior analysts also conform to the tradition of teaching as lecturing. Perhaps the prospect of adopting a new format appears un- pleasant simply by virtue of requiring more work. Perhaps, in addition to be- ing at odds with the traditions of aca- deme, the behaviorally based alterna- tives seem not to be very user-friendly. We shall attempt to show that one can retain several of the key features of PSI and PT in arrangements that are less at odds with the customs and administra- tive arrangements of a typical college or university. In the formats that we advocate here, much of class time is spent in active, well-focused discus- sion among students. Brief lectures still occur, but they address topics that stu- dents have identified as needing clari- fication. Guided by the student's re- quests, lecture preparation is targeted and efficient.
ACCOMMODATING BEHAVIOR ANALYSIS TO EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTIONS: STRATEGIES FOR BREAKING OUT OF
THE BOX We believe an effective way to learn
something is to teach it. This basic phi-
INTERTEACHING 219
losophy is shared with proponents of reciprocal peer tutoring (RPT), a pro- cess in which students develop a series of test questions and use these ques- tions to quiz each other before exams (Griffin & Griffin, 1998). Students change roles from teacher to student during the day and may receive points for performing their roles competently (Greenwood, 1997). When compared to a control group, RPT has been shown to produce somewhat greater improvements in academic achieve- ment (Ginsberg-Block & Fantuzzo, 1997; Harper, Mallette, Maheady, Bent- ley, & Moore, 1995). In fact, Green- wood (1997) reported on 12 years of data indicating that at-risk students with mild disabilities acquired skills faster, retained more, and increased social competency to a greater degree with RPT than without it. On the other hand, RPT has produced only modest im- provements (when compared with a control group) in the reduction of aca- demic anxiety and student self-efficacy (Griffin & Griffin, 1998; Rittschof & Griffin, 2001). Still, even in studies in which only modest improvements were made, the students reported that RPT was helpful (e.g., Griffin & Griffin, 1997; Rittschof & Griffin, 2001). The characteristics that interteaching
has in common with RPT suggest a promising strategy for building appro- priate repertoires, because teaching typically entails precisely the reper- toires that we are trying to facilitate. One feature of our strategy is to in- volve students in teaching in an unob- trusive way that incidentally requires the skills of defining, interrelating, and applying the terms and principles of concern in a college course. A second feature of our strategy is that conse- quences are contingent on each stu- dent's arriving, at each class meeting, prepared to participate actively. Through normal social interaction, the person or people being taught will sup- ply the consequences of the teacher's preparation. One of the present authors (Hineline, 1974a, 1974b) initially at- tempted to arrange for students to teach
each other by assigning them to small discussion groups. This proved to be only partially successful, for in groups of five, two or three students do most of the talking; in groups of three, two do most of the talking. Thus, succes- sive approximations led inexorably to groups of two, where "total involve- ment" is maintained by natural contin- gencies of social interaction that are minimally aversive while leaving no place to hide. Interteaching differs from RPT in that the instructor devel- ops the questions, and sessions occur as a regular part of the classroom ar- rangement. Recall that in RPT, students develop the questions and typically quiz each other only before exams.
In the initial attempts with groups of two, the core activity was characterized as "interviewing," patterned after Ferster and Perrott (1968), in which students took turns evaluating each other's answers to previously supplied study questions. After a few iterations, however, it became "interteaching," which is more collaborative than eval- uative, more cooperative than compet- itive. The dyadic discussions, whether interviewing or interteaching, were conducted with the aid of a preparation guide that was supplied in advance-a list of questions based upon the read- ing assignment for the day. In the in- terviewing format, the questions tend- ed to be fairly straightforward, much like the "study objectives" that are commonly supplied with textbooks. With the shift to the interteaching for- mat, these were supplemented with more problem-oriented questions that required the student to interrelate con- cepts that the text had treated as dis- tinct, or to attempt novel inferences and applications. During the sessions of dyadic discussion, the interviewer (or the interteachers working collabo- ratively) used a record sheet to indicate topics that gave trouble. Turned in at the end of class, these record sheets be- came the bases for the instructor's re- cord keeping and preparation for the next day's brief lecture.
Other features were varied during
220 THOMAS E. BOYCE & PHILIP N. HINELINE
the exploratory years of working with- in this framework. For example, if the instructor had anticipated that a given topic would prove difficult for the stu- dents (having found that these topics tend to be the same from semester to semester in the same course), poten- tially difficult topics were sometimes handled in advance by preceding the interviews with "troubleshooting ses- sions." In these, the class was initially divided into clusters of six or eight for guided problem solving before stu- dents paired up for interteaching. If in- terviewing, rather than interteaching, was to be the activity, each student had an equal probability of being an inter- viewer or interviewee; roles were de- cided at the beginning of a session by flipping a coin. Various joint contin- gencies were tried, whereby students' grades were determined in part by the quiz performance of the other students with whom they had worked.
Although either interviewing or in- terteaching works most effectively as an integral part of a coherent package such as will be described below, either one can be used initially to supplement traditional lectures, thus easing into the alternative format. If (or as in our ex- perience, when) the instructor becomes comfortable with more and more of class time focused on what the stu- dents, rather than what the professor, is doing, lectures naturally evolve toward a role of supplementing the students' one-on-one interactions. That is, the natural contingencies of the new class- room arrangement should shape the in- structor's as well as the students' be- havior.
In the second author's history, an in- creasing proportion of class time was given over to the students' dyadic work, because it became clear that this dyadic work contributed most to the quality of their improving competency. This trend reached a limit, however, as indicated by student evaluations and by the instructor's informal assessments of classroom ambience. The best balance appears to place the instructor at the front of the room about one third of the
time. As an alternative to changing from a lecture format gradually, one could try an arrangement such as that presented below, which evolved through many iterations.
AN INTEGRATED COURSE PACKAGE BASED ON INTERTEACHING
An interteach is a mutually probing, mutually informing conversation be- tween two people. It lasts 30 to 40 min, and deals with the main points in a specified selection of material (text- book or articles). A preparation guide is provided, often in advance (although the first author has started providing the preparation guide in class on the day of the scheduled interteach), indi- cating the source material, the due date, and what should be stressed. The guides may be ultimately used as aids for studying, and often provide the out- line for supplementary notes. During interteaching, however, students are explicitly told not to use supplemen- tary notes. It is emphasized that time should be used for discussing the ques- tions, not reading, and that the guide should be used as a prompt for con- versation. (See Appendix A for an ex- ample of a preparation guide.)
Although the reader might question the accuracy and quality of feedback that students provide to each other about their answers, the instructor can often catch inappropriate responses in his or her facilitation of the interteach- ing sessions. In addition, lecture is de- signed to clarify such issues. The sec- ond author has tried using only expe- rienced tutors and has considered using a "pyramid system," but he has found such arrangements to be cumbersome. Although we have not experienced troubling effects related to quality of interteaching (at least as measured by quiz performance and overall grades), we would welcome potential solutions from readers of this paper.
For a basic strategy, the students are advised to begin each session by clear- ly defining key concepts involved in
INTERTEACHING 221
the study questions, even if the ques- tions do not specifically ask for defi- nitions. Defining terms in this manner helps prevent misinterpretation of the questions. If students are unsure, or disagree about an answer, they are en- couraged to discuss it with the instruc- tor (or, if available, with a teaching as- sistant). The instructor's job during in- terteaching is to provide individual help and clarification for those who re- quest it and otherwise facilitate discus- sions. When done appropriately, the classroom environment is much like that of a dynamic workshop.
During or immediately after an in- terteach session, participants complete a record form that is provided. The re- cord forms request information that in- cludes (a) identification of the student and his or her partner, (b) topics that gave difficulty, and (c) topics that the students would like reviewed in lec- ture. One might also use the record sheet to ask students ancillary ques- tions such as which questions from the study guide should be eliminated or to rate the quality of their interteach ses- sion on a scale of 1 = poor to 10 = outstanding. (See Appendix B for a copy of the interteach record.)
Because it has been found that self- pacing induces an inefficient pattern of responding that approximates the clas- sic fixed-interval scallop (Ferster & Skinner, 1957), interteaches have due dates. Credit for interteaching in class and on time has become the standard. Interteaching after the due date or out- side of class may result in reduced credit, and if it becomes a student's common pattern, no credit at all. Stu- dents are required to work with many different people over the weeks and should not work with the same person on consecutive occasions or more than a few times in a semester. Repeated in- terteaching with the same person for a given unit of material results in no credit for those sessions. (It has proven to be important to ensure that each stu- dent works with a variety of other peo- ple; indeed, the best 1st-day instruction is "Work with someone you didn't
know before you came in here." One might have thought that the main prob- lem here would be that the best pre- pared students prefer to work together. However, in our experience, the greater and more frequent risk is that the weaker students choose to work to- gether.) The authors have found 10% of a
final grade based simply on participa- tion in interteaching to be an effective contingency to maintain competent in- terteaching. Although credit allocation for interteaching is small relative to that based on evaluated performance, it is enough to benefit students whose performance places them near the bor- der between two letter grades. An ad- ditional 10% may be based on the quality of interteaching, as explained below.
An Improved Role for Lectures
As we have noted, a common activ- ity among university instructors is pre- paring course lectures. Instructors of- ten struggle with what to include in lecture, trying to find a balance of pro- viding information consistent with a textbook (or other reading materials) without being redundant. Interteaching provides an alternative to this struggle. With lectures deemphasized, students' participation in interteach sessions yields a wealth of information regard- ing course material that gave them dif- ficulty, that they found interesting and would like supplemented, and that was easily learned from the text and inter- teaching sessions, and thus did not re- quire lecturing. The instructor's job is to analyze the content of the interteach records and develop a lecture around the themes that appeared most fre- quently across interteach records. We have found that a simple frequency count is effective for this, noting how often a question or topic was recorded as difficult or as especially interesting. This simple technique makes abun- dantly clear what one needs to address in lectures to maintain the students' in- terest and facilitate their learning the
222 THOMAS E. BOYCE & PHILIP N. HINELINE
key concepts. Lecture preparation is eased also because, having listened in during interteaching, one already has a tentative set of topics to be covered; review of the interteach records typi- cally prompts minor adjustments. At this point, one is ready to generate the lecture notes.
Recall that as conceived in PSI, lec- tures were described as "motivation- al," and were used as consequences contingent on student mastery. In this context, it is noteworthy that there are data to indicate that attendance at op- tional lectures is highest when the lec- ture promises to discuss material that will be on future quizzes (rather than just providing information) or when quizzes are given on lecture days (Lloyd et al., 1972). This makes sense simply because of the contingencies placed on student behavior. Why should a busy student attend a lecture on material he or she already knows if it will not affect his or her course grades? In contrast, lectures developed from interteach records are explicit consequences of the students' manding specific information. Thus, if the lec- ture is properly developed, its potency as a reinforcer is virtually assured. It has been our experience that once the students contact this contingency, at- tendance at lectures remains high.
Probes
The student's developing repertoires should be evaluated frequently, and the evaluations should be keyed closely to the study questions that provided the basis for interteaching. We characterize our evaluations as "probes"; a probe is like a quiz, except that students know the possible questions in ad- vance. Directed toward effective inter- teaching, the probe may include a writ- ten paragraph answer to one or two questions drawn directly from the preparation guides covered since the preceding probe. The probe may also include a few simple questions (define and comment, true-false, multiple choice, or matching among multiple al-
ternatives) that are based on other questions in those preparation guides. (Questions evoking greater synthesis or creativity should have been incorporat- ed into the preparation guides, rather than introduced by surprise.)
Regardless of format, probes should occur regularly and frequently. We rec- ommend a minimum of five probes during a semester, and have given them as frequently as every third class meet- ing. The trade-off, of course, concerns the amount of time taken up by the probes themselves. A probe should contain items explicitly emphasized in class activities and offer students the opportunity to improve interteaching skills, if necessary. For this reason we recommend allowing students to drop their lowest probe score. A missed probe, however, should constitute the lowest score. An effective contingency to ensure that all probes are at least at- tempted is not to allow missed probes to be dropped. Given these contingen- cies, students are made aware that grades will not be curved.
Quality Points for Interteaching
A common concern of instructors re- garding the interteaching process is re- lated to the quality of the activity dur- ing those sessions. That is, how can one be sure that the students behave during interteaching in the way that we had planned? There are a few ways. First, the instructor is present in the classroom to stimulate discussions with appropriately placed prompts, correct technical language as necessary, pro- vide examples, and otherwise facilitate the conversations. In addition, the first author has placed a social contingency on interteaching in which students are asked to rate the quality of their ses- sion on a scale of 1 to 10. Specifically, the pair must agree on a score and pro- vide justification for the score they agreed upon. As evidenced by com- ments regarding the difficulty of cer- tain topics, and statements such as "we could have spent more time preparing this chapter," requiring that students
INTERTEACHING 223
justify their score appears to prevent them from "inflating" their quality rat- ings. Finally, there is a formal class- room contingency based on quality. Specifically, students are told that if on a given paragraph question appearing on a probe, both the student and the person with whom he or she inter- taught on that question scores a grade of A or B, points will be added to each student's probe score. Thus, it becomes worthwhile to interteach effectively, because quality interteaching can sup- plement all students' probe scores and ultimately their grades in the course. The challenge for the instructor (a mi- nor chore, once it becomes routine) is to maintain records that allow him or her to easily identify who taught with whom on the particular interteach question selected for inclusion on the probe.
THE RELATION OF INTERTEACHING TO OTHER
BEHAVIOR-ANALYTIC INSTRUCTIONAL TECHNIQUES
As we mentioned earlier, it has been demonstrated that the PSI method of instruction is superior to traditional lecture courses as measured by student grades (Born et al., 1972). In addition, it has been suggested that each com- ponent of a PSI course is essential to producing the improvements in learn- ing. Indeed, Calhoun (1976) demon- strated the superior effects of PSI courses that included all elements of Keller's (1968) model compared to those in which at least one component was missing. Thus, it becomes infor- mative to discuss the characteristics of interteaching in comparison with the essential components of PSI. As established by Keller (1968),
"true PSI" includes self-pacing, mas- tery requirements, little emphasis on lectures, an emphasis on the written word, and the use of proctors to pro- duce "enhancement of the personal-so- cial aspect of the educational process" (p. 83). Interteaching certainly capital- izes on the latter component. Specifi-
cally, interteaching requires that stu- dents assist each other in understand- ing key course topics. With the addi- tion of the more contrived contingency related to quality points, it has been our experience that students spend time with the course material outside of class so as not to disappoint their in- terteaching partner in class. With the addition of having students rate the quality of their interteach sessions, the social contingencies become even more salient. With appropriate contin- gencies in place, Diamond (1972) found that student-led discussions were perceived to be an asset to large lecture courses.
Interteaching does not necessarily allow self-pacing. However, because students complete interteach records, they do influence which material gets more attention in lecture. Enabling stu- dents to select the material to be cov- ered in lecture, while leaving time management to the instructor, places a greater emphasis on material that has not been mastered without the neces- sity of spending more class time on a given unit of material. This seems to be an acceptable alternative to the self- paced aspect of PSI that is one major source of resistance to Keller's model. That is, some students do not finish PSI courses in a reasonable amount of time, and PSI tends to produce higher dropout rates than traditional lecture courses. Born et al. (1972) found that when compared to traditional lecture courses, withdrawal rates were higher for PSI and that students who rotated between PSI and traditional lecture courses were more likely to withdraw during the PSI format. This problem appears to have been eliminated with the use of interteaching without sacri- ficing the benefits.
Although lectures have a reduced role in courses using the interteach for- mat, they appear to have a reinforcing effect, because students mand infor- mation from the instructor. A mand, by definition, specifies its own reinforcer. If hearing the lecture is contingent on student attendance at the next meeting,
224 THOMAS E. BOYCE & PHILIP N. HINELINE
student attendance at that meeting should be maintained. This is precisely what the authors have found. Addition- al contingencies, as described previ- ously, maintain attendance at classes during which interteaching is the focus. The more seasoned instructor will like- ly use a course format in which a lec- ture based on the interteach of the pre- vious class day occurs at the beginning of each new class, and is then followed by an interteach that yields information for the next class lecture, and so on. Once on schedule, student attendance and performance are maintained, and the instructor's work in setting up the arrangements described here is rein- forced in turn by what goes on during class.
Interteaching does not stress the written word per se as emphasized in PSI. However, the spoken word is val- ued. And, transfer of training from the spoken word to the written word is as- sessed by means of the paragraph ques- tion on each probe. Regardless, em- phasis is placed on applying concepts to solve problems and on integrating information. This is consistent with the call of Machado and Silva (1998) who documented the perils of teaching def- initions and probing with multiple- choice exams.
Finally, mastery is not explicitly re- quired in interteaching. However, the elaborate yet easily maintained contin- gencies, including probes at least five times per semester, appear to shape "mastery-like" repertoires. Although the authors have not yet systematically collected data on performance in inter- teach versus traditional lecture formats of the same course, anecdotal evidence indicates that students perform better than average when involved in inter- teaching. In addition, student evalua- tions of the courses taught in this man- ner have proved to be outstanding. In fact, since adopting the interteaching format, the second author has received several teaching awards, and the first author's annual merit evaluations of teaching have all been "excellent." Thus, interteaching appears to be ped-
agogically useful to both instructors and students.
CUSTOMIZING INTERTEACHING FOR VARIOUS
CLASS SCHEDULES
We have found that interteaching is more conducive to some schedules than to others. Three 50-min sessions per week work better than longer, less frequent meetings. Still there is much room for variation. For example, the first author has used interteaching in 8- hr seminars for students in a master's level course that meets off campus on weekends. By simply scheduling breaks after interteaching sessions, the instructor is able to prepare a lecture from slide templates of course material prepared in advance on computer graphics. The 8-hr day is thus broken down into sections of interteach, fol- lowed by brief lecture, interteach, lec- ture, and so on. Using these formats, even on such a schedule, we some- times find that students complain that class sessions are too short or fail to notice when the class time ended. We believe these reactions are related to the variety of activities scheduled for students during class time. These same activities constitute the repertoires we desire to teach.
If, as we have asserted, the best way to learn something is to teach it, inter- teaching develops this repertoire early in the academic careers of our students. Its utility in courses outside psycholo- gy still needs to be documented, and systematic research on the perfor- mance improvements produced by in- terteaching even within our field is warranted. We would be delighted to see such work accomplished. Our agenda here is somewhat different, however. One can function as scientist in some contexts and as scientifically informed artisan in others. In that man- ner it should be legitimate to apply pre- viously validated principles in behav- iorally informed but new and flexible ways. Thus, whatever their research
INTERTEACHING 225
specialties, we wish to encourage young instructors and seasoned instruc- tors alike to implement in their own classrooms some of the user-friendly behavioral arrangements described here, perhaps using them as a starting point for innovations of their own.
REFERENCES
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Born, D. G., Gledhill, S. M., & Davis, M. L. (1972). Examination performance in lecture- discussion and personalized instruction cours- es. Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis, 5, 33-43.
Calhoun, J. F (1976). The combination of ele- ments in the personalized system of instruc- tion. Teaching of Psychology, 3, 73-75.
Catania, A. C. (1998). Learning (4th ed.). Up- per Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall.
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Ferster, C. B., & Skinner, B. F (1957). Sched- ules of reinforcement. New York: Appleton- Century-Crofts.
Ginsberg-Block, M., & Fantuzzo, J. (1997). Re- ciprocal peer tutoring: An analysis of "teach- er" and "student" interactions as a function of training and experience. School Psychology Quarterly, 12, 134-149.
Greenwood, C. (1997). Classwide peer tutoring. Behavior and Social Issues, 7, 53-57.
Griffin, M. M., & Griffin, B. W. (1998). An investigation of the effects of reciprocal peer tutoring on achievement, self-efficacy, and test anxiety. Contemporary Educational Psy- chology, 23, 298-311.
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Hineline, P. N. (1974b). An experimental ap- proach to learning: Introduction for teachers. In R. Ulrich, T Stachnik, & J. Mabry (Eds.), Control of human behavior: Vol. 3. Behavior modification in education. Scott Foresman.
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APPENDIX A Sample Preparation Guide from an Undergraduate Course PREPARATION GUIDE 6 Based upon Malott, Whaley, and Mal- ott (4th ed., p. 94-120), for interteach- ing on Wednesday, September 20.
. **Identifies questions that are not directly answered in the book. 1. Describe how it is that the "law of
effect" characterizes both reinforce- ment effects and punishment ef- fects.
2. Regarding pp. 97-99: (a) Describe a reversal design,
and explain the role of its baseline conditions.
**(b) Often, in applied research, ABAB designs are preferred over ABA designs. Why is this so?
226 THOMAS E. BOYCE & PHILIP N. HINELINE
3. (a) Describe an extinction pro- cedure, as applied to Lucille's office visits, and describe the effects of that procedure.
(b) How does the extinction pro- cedure differ from a penalty procedure? (cf. pp. 94-95)
4. (a) Describe the traditional way parents attempt to reduce bedtime crying. What is wrong with this technique?
(b) Describe the use of extinction to reduce bedtime crying. In- clude the reinforcer withheld and the results.
(c) Draw a hypothetical graph [because the authors did not supply actual data] that illus- trates the pattern of behavior that occurred during the ex- tinction of bedtime crying. What parts of your graph il- lustrate spontaneous recov- ery? How so?
5. Compare and contrast extinction, response cost, and time-out (a) with the example of Uncle Sid and his swearing niece and nephew, (b) with an example of your own de- vising. (c) What are the advantages and disadvantages of each?
6. Describe the two distinct contingen- cies that were discontinued in the extinction of Laura's vomiting. (pp. 109-1 10)
7. Why was a punishment procedure preferable to an extinction proce- dure for reducing Judy's self-inju- rious behavior, as described on pp. 111-1 12?
8. Explain: "Recovery after punish- ment is discontinued and extinction after reinforcement is discontinued are closely analogous, but opposite
in direction" (pp. 113-114). Iden- tify the features of the two graphs in Figure 6.10 that illustrate this statement.
9. What are the differences between extinction and forgetting? Describe some common examples that illus- trate the difference.
APPENDIX B
Record of Interteaching
Date:
Guide number and topic
Participants:
Duration of interteach:
Sufficient time provided?
Quality of session (on a scale of 1 = poor to 10 = excellent):
Topics that gave difficulty, and the na- ture of the difficulty (e.g., text was un- clear, question was ambiguous):
Topics you would like covered in class:
What parts did you find most interest- ing? If a question were to be omitted, which should it be?
Other comments or suggestions? Please give me feedback.
