Measuring Academic Output During the Good Behavior Game: A Single Case Design Study

Abstract

The impact of the Good Behavior Game (GBG) on students’ classroom behavior has been studied for 50 years. What is less established is the impact of the GBG on students’ academic progress. With emerging research in curriculum-based measurement for written expression (WE-CBM), it may be possible to observe changes in students’ writing output while playing the GBG versus when the game is not played. The purpose of the current study was to systematically introduce the GBG during writing practice time in a Grade 1 and Grade 2 classroom, and observe any changes to all students’ academic engagement, disruptive behavior, as well as target students’ writing output using WE-CBM. Results indicated large increases in all students’ academic engagement and decreases in disruptive behavior when the GBG was played. For writing output, target students demonstrated modest improvement in the amount of words written and accuracy of writing when the game was played, especially students identified as having emerging writing skills. Future studies might continue to empirically explore the connection between behavioral intervention and academic output by replicating study procedures in different contexts and/or with alternative WE-CBM indices.