Optimistic Teaching: Improving the Capacity for Teachers to Reduce Young Children’s Challenging Behavior

This pilot study compared the differential impact of two professional development interventions to improve preschool teachers’
use of positive behavioral interventions and supports (PBIS) and decrease young children’s social emotional difficulties.
Teachers were randomly assigned to one of two coaching interventions conducted over the course of one academic year. Teachers
received either Optimistic Teaching, an approach combining traditional coaching in PBIS with a cognitive-behavioral component
to address teachers’ self-efficacy, or traditional PBIS coaching. Teachers in the Optimistic Teaching condition implemented
significantly more PBIS skills related to teaching children social skills and involving families in their children’s social
emotional development when compared to teachers who were exposed to traditional PBIS coaching alone. Teachers in the Optimistic
Teaching condition reported significantly fewer children with serious social emotional difficulties post-intervention. Teachers’
experience and self-reported self-efficacy were analyzed for their influence on teachers’ post-intervention use of PBIS skills.
The results are discussed in light of how future professional development efforts might address preschool teachers’ motivation
to adopt new practices such as PBIS.