In regard to Dylan’s ability to give authority figures other important information, Ms. Jones decided to focus on response generalization. In addition to her address, Ms. Jones wanted Dylan to be able to give her personal phone number and each of her parent’s phone numbers upon request of an adult authority figure. 

Ms. Jones operationally defined three objectives to determine response generalization had occurred:

• Upon adult request, Dylan will give her 9-digit personal cell phone number on 10/10 opportunities. 
• Upon adult request, Dylan will give her mother’s 9-digit personal cell phone number on 10/10 opportunities. 
• Upon adult request, Dylan will give her father’s 9-digit personal cell phone number on 10/10 opportunities.

With these objectives operationally defined, Ms. Jones was then ready to determine an instructional method and generalization setting. She knew that Dylan would require repeated instructional trials to learn and discriminate between the three phone numbers. Ms. Jones decided that it would be more efficient to provide these increased trials in a 1-1 setting. She also knew that direct instruction was an instructional method involving increased opportunities to respond and participate.

• Instructional Setting: 1-1
• Instructional Method: Direct instruction

Ms. Jones then determined a generalization tactic and support strategy. She noted that adults might ask Dylan for her or her parents’ phone numbers in a variety of ways. For example, someone might ask specifically for her dad’s phone number, but they might also ask for a parent’s phone number in general. If Dylan provided one parent’s phone number and that parent was unavailable, she would need to provide the other parent’s number. Ms. Jones wanted to make sure she prepared Dylan for all of these scenarios, and therefore decided the generalization tactic would be teaching multiple examples. Although she considered using embedded opportunities, Ms. Jones did not think she would be able to contrive a reinforcing contingency for the operationally-defined skills. Instead, she decided to use Dylan’s token reinforcement system.

• Generalization Tactic: Teach multiple examples
• Support Strategy: Reinforcement

Ms. Jones’s Lesson on “Relaying Important Information”

Creating a Reinforcing Direct Instruction

First, Ms. Jones used errorless learning, shaping, and time-delay prompts during 1-1 direct instruction to teach Dylan the three phone numbers. At first, she used consistent questions (i.e., “What’s your phone number?” and “What’s your dad’s / mom’s phone number?”) during instruction. She provided token reinforcement for each independent correct response during initial instruction.

Teaching Multiple Examples

When Dylan was able to consistently state each phone number, Ms. Jones began teaching multiple examples. She made a list of ten different questions that could be used to ask for a phone number, and she interspersed these questions. Sometimes, Ms. Jones would ask for a parent’s number, and Dylan would provide either her mother’s or father’s number. Ms. Jones would pretend to call that parent and then explain that they did not answer the phone. Then, Dylan would have to provide the other parent’s phone number. During this part of instruction, Ms. Jones provided token reinforcement for every 1-3 correct responses. 

After Dylan was consistently discriminating between the three phone numbers and responding to a variety of appropriate requests for phone numbers, Ms. Jones described the different types of people who would ask Dylan for her number or her parents’ numbers and the different situations which would require Dylan to provide this information. Finally, Ms. Jones and Dylan discussed other situations which might occur. They discussed who would ask Dylan for her phone number or her parents’ numbers and why sharing this information could be necessary.