School Consultation: Conceptual and Empirical Bases of Practice (Issues in Clinical Child Psychology)

School consultation is a process for providing psychological and educational services in which a specialist (consultant) works cooperatively with a staff member (consultee) to improve the learning and adjustment of a student (client) or a group of students. During face-to-face interactions, the consultant helps the consultee through systematic problem solving, social influence, and professional support. In turn, the consultee helps the client by selecting, implementing, and evaluating school-based interventions. In all cases, school consultation serves a remedial function and has the potential to serve a preventive function. In this volume, the authors offer a systematic approach to school consultation that differs from those that have been published previously. Specifically, the authors combine the most useful and/or empirically validated principles from mental health and behavioral consultation with practices shown to be effective in contemporary consultation research (i.e. behavior analysis, social influence, and implementation support). In so doing, the authors describe for the first-time consultant when and how to apply these principles in response to a wide range of consultee and client needs, and offer a thorough discussion of the realities inherent in providing services within a school organizational context. This second edition also includes expanded coverage on the following topics: -implications of the 1997 IDEA Amendments for school consultation; -empirically validated approaches to the support and development task; -methods for conducting a functional behavioral assessment; -a listing of instructional interventions; -teacher shortage, recruitment and retention issues; -prereferral intervention teams and programs; -strategies to increase teacher skill transfer and maintenance; and -inclusion of new research studies that inform the effective practice of school consultation.

Since its emergence during the 1960s, school consultation has become an important vehicle for delivering psychological and educational services. Cooperative efforts between skilled consultants and teachers, rooted in the principles of problem solving, social influence, and professional development, enhance student learning and adjustment while encouraging consultees to be more effective and proactive in their practice.

The Third Edition of School Consultation: Conceptual and Empirical Bases of Practice shows in expert detail how this relationship works by synthesizing mental health and behavioral models of consultation with the most effective evidence-based practices (e.g., implementation support, response to intervention) informing the field today. The authors provide real-world contexts for all participants in the equation—consultants, teachers, students, staff, and the school itself—and thoroughly review consultation processes and outcomes for a contemporary practice-oriented approach suited to the new consultant, trainee, or researcher.

Key features of the Third Edition include:

• An integrated mental health/behavioral model for school consultation.
• An organizational study of the school as a setting for consultation.
• Assessment issues and strategies particularly relevant to school consultation.
• Approaches to providing teachers with implementation support.
• Conceptual models for selecting academic and behavioral interventions.
• Administrative perspectives on school consultation.
• A real, transcribed case study analyzed by the authors.

In the tradition of its predecessors, School Consultation, Third Edition, is a confidence-building tool for practitioners in school psychology, clinical child psychology, educational specialties, school counseling, special education, and school social work as well as a trusted reference for researchers in these fields.

Booknews

A guide for child psychologists who are or would like to be consultants to schools. Combines useful and empirically validated principles from mental health and behavioral consultation with consultation practices shown to be effective, such as behavior analysis, social influence, and social support. Includes three interviews with consultants. Annotation c. by Book News, Inc., Portland, Or.

School consultation is a process for providing psychological and educational services in which a specialist (consultant) works cooperatively with a staff member (consultee) to improve the learning and adjustment of a student (client) or a group of students. During face-to-face interactions, the consultant helps the consultee through systematic problem solving, social influence, and professional support. In turn, the consultee helps the client by selecting, implementing, and evaluating school-based interventions. In all cases, school consultation serves a remedial function and has the potential to serve a preventive function. In this volume, the authors combine the most useful and/or empirically validated principles from mental health and behavioural consultation with practices shown to be effective in contemporary consultation research (that is, behaviour analysis, social influence, and implementation support).; In so doing, the authors describe when and how to apply these principles in response to a wide range of consultee and client needs, and offer a thorough discussion of the realities inherent in providing services within a school organizational context. This second edition also includes expanded coverage on the following topics: implications of the 1997 IDEA Amendments for school consultation; empirically validated approaches to the support and development task; methods for conducting a functional behavioural assessment; a listing of instructional interventions; teacher shortage, recruitment and retention issues; prereferral intervention teams and programs; strategies to increase teacher skill transfer and maintenance; and inclusion of new research studies that inform the effective practice of school consultation This integrative volume offers a systematic approach to school consultation unlike those previously published. Erchul and Martens combine the most useful and empirically validated principles from mental health and behavioral consultation with practices shown to be effective in contemporary consultation research (i.e., behavior analysis, social influence, and social support). In so doing, the authors view the practice of school consultation as the accomplishment of three interrelated tasks: problem solving, social influence, and professional support and development. School Consultation describes the fundamentals of practice and fully explores processes and potential outcomes. Special attention is paid to the needs of first-time consultants, who are given advice on how to select school-based interventions and to assess their effectiveness in terms of treatment outcome, integrity, and social validity. The authors show that the school is a large organization providing a range of services, and that the delivery of these services is influenced at once by legislation, the limitations of educational approaches to classification, and the challenges and rewards facing individual teachers. School Consultation is an important resource for school consultants, clinical child psychologists, school psychologists, educational specialists, counselors, special educators, and school social workers, as well as consultation researchers, university trainers, and students in graduate-level consultation courses. Introduction to Consultation....Pages 3-18 Promoting Change in Schools....Pages 19-48 The School as a Setting for Consultation....Pages 49-70 Bases of an Integrated Model of School Consultation....Pages 73-96 Model Description and Application....Pages 97-118 Selecting and Evaluating School-Based Interventions....Pages 119-137 Teachers as Consultees....Pages 141-161 Students as Clients....Pages 163-181 Consultation Case Study....Pages 183-202 Epilogue: The Effective Practice of School Consultation....Pages 203-212