Chapter 11 - Ignoring Problem Behavior

Is It Working?

Ignoring works best when you evaluate its effectiveness and make changes when you need to.

If the behavior you want to stop, stops, then you know that ignoring it worked. In the beginning, you might not be sure so it is best to keep track of the behavior. Count the number of times it occurs everyday and keep track over time. See if the count goes down. If it doesn't get smaller you will need to decide why not.

Example:

Your child tantrums all day long (or at least it seems that way!). Count how many tantrums your child really does have. Count them and write the counts on a piece of paper each time your child has a tantrum. You can then keep track of how many happen when you consistently ignore them.

Day of the Week	Number of Tantrums
Monday	IIIII IIIII III
Tuesday	IIIII IIIII IIIII II
Wednesday	IIIII II
Thursday	IIIII I
Friday	III
Saturday	I

Using a record like this one over a week, you can see that ignoring the tantrums did work by the end of the week. At first it certainly didn't seem like it though. For a printable version of this chart, visit our Printouts Page - Tantrum Tracking Chart