Student Services

Planning with Positive Behaviour Interventions and Supports

Manitoba Education and Early Childhood Learning Consultants assist school division Student Services Administrators to apply strategies to create learning environments to support student success, academically and behaviourally. In Manitoba, the three-tiered model (primary, secondary, and tertiary) offers school teams a framework to identify evidence of what strengths, needs, and priorities are present. This frame helps plan continuum of proactive and responsive supports and services for all students.

Each tier of intervention and supports will range in complexity related to the severity of needs and abilities including collaborative planning with family involvement and supportive student-specific planning.  

The themes that are common to successful implementation include the development of a positive school climate, a school-wide approach, data-informed decision making, collaborative team panning, community involvement, strengths-based practices, and professional support.

The intent of school-wide positive behaviour support is to develop a foundation where appropriate, expected behaviours in a positive school climate are the norm for all students. This evidence-based practice involves proactive and explicit teaching of behavioural expectations and pro-social problem solving.

One framework that some school divisions utilize is the three tiers of the Positive Behaviour Support model. This model represents a continuum of increasingly intense level of interventions and supports that correspond to the responsiveness of student needs and abilities. Positive Behavioural Interventions and Supports (PBIS) emphasizes five inter-related elements: equity, data, systems, practices, and outcomes.

Continuum of School-Wide
Instructional & Positive Behaviour Support

Pyramid Model

This pyramid model illustrates the continuum of behavioural needs in a typical student population.

  • Tertiary Prevention:
    • Specialized/Student-specific
    • Intensive level of response and supports
    • Systems for Students with High-Risk
  • Secondary Prevention:
    • Specialized Group
    • Targeted levels of interventions and supports
    • Systems for Students with At-Risk Behaviour
  • Primary Prevention:
    • School/Classroom-Wide expectations, routines
      for All Students, Staff, across all school Settings
    • Foundational for positive and proactive support

All students will benefit from a universal system of interventions and supports.

Primary Prevention: Studies show that 80 to 85 percent of students generally meet the school’s behavioural expectations and that for this group of students the universal supports and interventions are sufficient to maintain positive behaviour.

Secondary Prevention: More targeted interventions, such as social skills instruction and behavioural intervention strategies, will benefit the 5 to 15 percent of students who are at risk of developing serious behaviour problems.

Tertiary Prevention: One to 7 percent do not respond to universal and/or targeted interventions. These students have behaviour challenges severe enough that they cannot meet behavioural expectations without intensive, individualized interventions.

Visit these websites for related information:

Information for Schools, Students, and Families

The Inclusion Support Branch provides consultation to schools and school divisions in the area of planning with positive behaviour supports for school-wide, classroom-based and student specific needs.

Links

School-Based Links
Classroom-Based Links
  • Towards Inclusion: Supporting Positive Behaviour in Manitoba Classrooms
     This classroom based support document describes both proactive and reactive procedures and practices associated with positive behaviour support for use in the Manitoba classroom context.
  • Success for All Learners: A Handbook on Differentiating Instruction: A Resource for Kindergarten to Senior 4 Schools (1996). Not available online. Please send detailed request to isbinfo@gov.mb.ca.
Student-Specific Links

Legislation, Standards, Policies

Contact

General Enquiries
Inclusion Support Branch
Manitoba Education and Early Childhood Learning
Telephone: 204-945-7912
Toll Free in Manitoba: 1-800-282-8069, ext. 7912
Email: isbinfo@gov.mb.ca