Signage as a Classroom Prompt: An Evidence-Based Practice?

Prompting

Teachers routinely “prompt” students to elicit a variety of behaviors. Examples include a bell or buzzer to promote a rapid line up for a fire drill, or posting a number line or a cursive-letter alphabet on a bulletin board to promote math and written expression, respectively. Prompts are described as “supplementary antecedent stimuli used to occasion a correct response in the presence of an S^D [stimulus for a behavior] that will eventually control the behavior” (Cooper, Heron, & Heward. 2007, p. 401). In effect, “prompts are used to increase the probabilities of success in a task” (Walker, Shea, & Bauer, 2004, p. 113). Cooper and colleagues propose three kinds of prompts; verbal (e.g., “The animal that ‘oinks’ is?”); modeling (e.g., a P.E. teacher placing her toes behind the back line to illustrate from where to serve a volleyball); and physical guidance (e.g., physically positioning a student’s thumb on the “C” key of the piano to begin a C scale).

Alberto and Troutman (2009) add to this list, visual expressions. A multiplication/division matrix, periodic table, student photos over preschool cubbies, and signs for hand washing in the bathroom are examples seen in schools. Alberto and Troutman add several examples in which vocational skills are taught using a sequence of pictures to illustrate what an individual should do to assemble a product or complete a process (e.g., preparing a hamburger, wrapping a sandwich in a fast-food restaurant). They contend that posting such information in plain view can reduce instructional time and promote classroom order. Adults are familiar with a visual prompts in the form of a “post-it” note that serves as a reminder to perform a domestic task like picking up milk on the way home.