Using Least-To-Most Assistive Prompt Hierarchy to Increase Child Compliance With Teacher Directives in Preschool Classrooms

Prompt strategies have been used to increase the compliance of preschool-aged children to teacher directives (Radley & Dart, 2015; Wilder & Atwell, 2006; Wolery & Gast, 1984). This paper describes two experiments conducted to determine if classroom teachers could learn to use the LtM prompt hierarchy and if child compliance would increase in response to teacher behavior. This study builds on the current literature base by using prompting, specifically LtM (first described by Horner & Keilitz, 1975), with the additional requirement of teacher-child proximity and teacher- child eye level prior to beginning the prompt sequence, which is consistent with recommended practice in early childhood (Copple & Bredekamp, 2009). The participants consisted of 6 preschool teachers, with varying levels of education and experience, across 2 different early childhood classrooms. Teacher prompts and children\u27s completion of teacher directives were measured during free choice center time. Results were consistent with previous research (Wilder & Atwell, 2006; Wolery & Gast, 1984) in that compliance to teacher directives increased in preschool children with the implementation of the LtM