Ep. 59: Making Your BIP Work: Data Collection and Fidelity in FBAs - Part 13 of the FBA Mini-Series

Part 13 (the last step) of the FBA Mini-Series!

You’ve got the plan… now let’s make sure it actually works. In this final episode of our FBA Mini-Series, Audra and Sami walk you through how to track behavior data, define roles, build fidelity, and make sure your BIP stays meaningful. This is the wrap-up you didn’t know you needed, filled with practical ways to follow through on everything you’ve created!

🔑 Key Takeaways
🧠 Track what matters – Collect data on both the target and replacement behaviors
📈 Keep it doable – Simple, regular data is better than complex forms no one uses
🧍‍♀️ Assign clear roles – Know who is collecting what, when, and how
🔍 Check fidelity – Use plan-specific and general fidelity checklists to stay on track
💬 Share updates – Include teachers and families in celebrations and progress
🎯 Define mastery – Know when the plan has “worked” and what comes next
♻️ Keep it alive – BIPs should be living documents that evolve with the student

📚 Resources and Ideas
📌 Free Download: Fidelity Checklist Template
📌 Related Episodes:
– Ep. 54: Creating the Behavior Plan – Part 10
– Ep. 12: Managing Problem Behaviors Through Replacement Skills

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🎙 Next Episode: Behavior Responses (positive/negative reinforcement/punishment) Made Clear!
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💬 Let us know if you use a Fidelity Checklist in your BIPs in our Facebook group  @TheMisfitBehaviorists
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Transcript

Ep. 59: Making Your BIP Work: Data Collection and Fidelity in FBAs - Part 13 of the FBA Mini-Series

[00:00:00] Intro: Welcome to the Misfit Behaviorist Podcast miniseries this round. Join your hosts, Audra Jensen and Sami Brown here to bring you fun and functional advice for creating and implementing behavior plans. Let's get started. 

[00:00:15] Audra: Welcome back to the Misfit Behaviorist Podcast. The misfit here and the behaviorist over there. Today's our final episode, me and Sami, doing the FBA miniseries, and we are closing the loop on everything we've talked about so far. Because even when we have that like best behavior plan, it's not going to work unless we track it, unless we check on it, unless we tweak it when it's needed. So today is all about that final data collection, fidelity checklist and why that's important, mastery, follow up. So that's what we are doing today.

[00:00:46] So I have six quick points that I wanna talk about. The very first thing I wanna talk about is those data collection procedures. So we can't guess our way to success. We have to know if the plan that we've created is actually helping. That's going to start with smart, manageable data collection. In my mind, what I like to have included are first like what are we tracking? I like to make sure we're tracking the behavior that we're trying to get rid of, the target behavior and the replacement behavior 'cause we've talked a lot about how important it is to have that replacement behavior that is meeting the same need of that target behavior. And so I like to have, whenever possible, something that we're tracking on both of those. Not only what we're tracking, but how often. So when I think about how often we're taking data, it really just comes to often enough to analyze and make decisions. So for some students and some behaviors, it's gonna be daily, it's gonna be frequency checks all the time, it's gonna be partial interval during every circle time or something like that. Other behaviors, maybe they're more of the big crisis behaviors where we're gonna track data as it happens, and then also replacement behaviors. It's gonna be dependent on that student and the behaviors that are and going. When I think about how often is really, how often do we need to look at this data to see if we're making the correct progress. 

[00:02:03] And then the third thing I think about here in making the data collection is how do we analyze it? So I like to do weekly reviews of the data, looking for trends or for spikes or for patterns or for when it plateaus and try to look at that as much as possible, that daily or even biweekly, 'cause if I look at just one day or one point, that doesn't really get me to see the pattern. Are we going the right direction or not? I wanna know if that target behavior is going down and I wanna see that replacement behavior going up. The quick piece from this point one that I wanna make is to keep it doable for you and your staff. 

[00:02:40] One of the things I like to do is using a quick three minute debrief and a review of the day's data can really help. Sometimes we'll do something and something happens with the student and it may make me go, okay, I need to go look at the patterns now. Maybe I hadn't checked that last week. Have we seen there's some sort of trend that's been happening that instigated this behavior? So really just making sure you're constantly thinking about those trends and patterns. 

[00:03:05] Sami: The data gives so many different pieces of information because you may find that one specific staff member is collecting the data in one way and it's skewed for whatever reason. It could have a bias involved. There could be someone who's collecting data as a punitive measure to be able to prove a point. So when you talked about also collecting behavior on the replacement behavior, whatever it is that they're being taught. To see the improvement, that creates that balance to be able to say, okay, this is the target behavior that's learned over time that we wanna improve upon because it's maladaptive and not socially acceptable for this specific individual, but here's what we're teaching them. And look at the growth that's happening here, and being able to use that as a full picture to make sure that your plan that's in place is actually making meaningful change. 

[00:03:52] Audra: Excellent. Those are really good points and that's another thing you might think about is making sure, as you mentioned, different staff members, if you're getting IOA data, if you have behaviors that you're tracking, especially with your replacement behaviors, have two people periodically take data on the same time frame and see if they're collecting the same data, and that will help you make sure that everybody is collecting it the same. Doesn't have to be all the time and every time, and I don't worry about calculating the 80% or whatever, but just have two people do it periodically and then maybe talk about it afterwards. Oh, did you see this thing? Yeah, I saw that, but I didn't think that it really met what we had talked about. And so having those little quick conversations really help too. 

[00:04:29] So the second thing I wanna talk about is who is responsible? Who is doing what, when you're deciding on data collection and what to do. If everybody thinks somebody else is doing it and somebody else is taking the data, then nobody is. You might have your teachers taking tallies on during their instruction. You might decide that paras are gonna observe during their routines. You might have your specialists, bring your speech therapist and your OTs into it. Maybe they're talking about modeling and coaching. Maybe they can collect some of the data in their settings as well. Making sure that they know what the data is and how to collect it there. And then, the BCBA or the behavior specialist is then collecting all this data, occasionally or weekly or whatever you work, put it together. And that's where you go back to looking at the trends and the patterns of behavior. So just making sure everybody on the team knows what they're doing, how often. We like to use initials or names on your forms or different lines if you're doing a partial interval during different times of the day. Making sure that your staff are marking who's doing it so that if you have somebody that is collecting it a little bit different than somebody else, and you can bring the correct people together to figure out where the discrepancies are and how we can fix that going forward. 

[00:05:36] Sami: We used to always joke too. It's really important that every single member of the team knows how to collect the data and is involved in the process because you might have one para who, that's their jam. They love it, and so everyone else is allowing them to do it. But if that one para wins the Powerball and moves away, now the whole team's disrupted because no one has that same efficacy of doing it.

[00:05:56] Audra: All right. Then the third thing is like when and how that data's gonna be shared with the team. So build within your team times, whether it's weekly team huddles or it's after every crisis, or it's during PLC or whatever you call your weekly meeting with your special ed team, or just IEP team emails. For us, we had certain times where we'd go into the different classrooms and pick up all the data and touch base. Then, sending out an email to the team every week or two and just saying, Hey, this is how we're doing here. I think that's really helpful. Whether you choose to have a shared folder through your district system or a Google Doc or something. Jotting down quick notes there, graph updates. We really like our graphs. Little behavior blurbs of how things are going. And then the other thing is really making sure your families are part of those updates, so giving them brief and regular check-ins through email or home communication logs, seesaw notes, or whatever you're using for your system at school. Also really share those celebrations and not just those bad days. Make sure that you proactively seek out your families when things are going well. And if you have, and we have some really difficult cases that may not have a lot of celebrations, you can find something to celebrate. And so make sure that you're doing that. Even if a surly kid comes in and they say hi, where they normally don't, make that something because the parents really feed on that. They really need that. 

[00:07:12] Sami: And the parents being a part of it as well is really important because we've discovered in the data at times that, oh, they were sick over the weekend and no one had known that 'cause we're trying to figure out what is the spike on this specific day? What happened on this? Oh that was their first day back from whatever period, that's important to be able to make additional notes within the data to show some sort of variation. 

[00:07:34] Audra: Yes, exactly. Point number four is talking about that mastery criteria. And I think this is something that a lot of us miss going forward, we set this plan, we don't really have an end date or an end situation. We just have a plan and we move forward hoping that it'll work. I think it's really important we think, from the very beginning, what would we consider mastery that this behavior plan is no longer needed for this particular student and this behavior. We need a finish line. Otherwise, I've heard it said we're running a marathon on a treadmill and it's just constantly going. Plus it's no fun. So some examples, you might have a target behavior that you've got reduced to less than one time a week for four weeks or something. That's gonna be the mastery that you can think, or a replacement behavior that is used independently 80% of opportunities across two months. Or a student completing a full routine five days in a row with no escalation, or this is one we've used a lot, no target behavior or reduced enough per your agreement on the team for six weeks. Whatever it is that fits that particular student and behavior, make sure you have that end state. I always like to keep in mind is this particular student may not be ready for a neurologically typical student, the same behavior, but always have that in mind. What are your neurotypical students doing with this behavior, with this replacement behavior, and have that in mind. Maybe that's not your end stage right now, but keep that in mind as you create your mastery criteria. Keep that realistic for the student, but always have that final stage in mind. 

[00:09:02] Sami: You often talk about that progress over perfection, whatever that mastery criteria is, it's not gonna be the same as just a typical student. When you're setting whatever that benchmark is, there could still be room for improvement from there on, but not making the goalpost, you're gonna keep moving it, so to speak. 

[00:09:20] Audra: Point number five is those fidelity checklist. And this isn't something everybody has in their plan, but I think is really useful. And we've used over the time that we've been working together and the different students we've worked with, and I think there's two different types of fidelity checklists that I've seen and I like to use. And I'm gonna create samples for you within the Facebook group and in show notes of the two different kinds that we use. One is just your general process checklist. And this is for when you're creating the behavior plan. You're going through the FBA process to make sure at the end you go back and check that we've hit everything that needs to be done to make this a solid plan. Did we define the behavior correctly? Did we figure out what the function is? Do we have a good replacement behavior? Do we have a strong hypothesis statement? Did we include antecedent and consequence strategies? All of these kind of general things. So I like to have one of those at the very end of the process. 

[00:10:07] And then the other kind of fidelity checklist is that plan specific, for this particular student, staff checklist. Our FBAs, our BIPs are many pages long, and I like to take everything that we concluded from that, the strategies we came up with, and then create a quick one to two page summary of that, of what to do at each stage of the day or the behavior what strategies we came up with. And then I like to have little check boxes so that, once a week or something, somebody goes in and looks at all the strategies we came up with. Are we observing that this needed to happen, that this was used? Was it used to fidelity, and it keeps it in everybody's mind what the plan was and also how we're administering it.

[00:10:46] Sami: A lot of times those documents get written and then they get set aside and then people are saying oh, it's not working, or We're still seeing these things. It's a really good opportunity for a classroom teacher to say, okay, let's pull out one of the Fidelity checklists and make sure that x, y, and z is happening.

[00:11:01] Audra: That's exactly what we like to do, so we keep 'em. Yes, we do. We keep 'em in our folders that have all the data. We keep all of the raw data too, because we'll input the data that we may be seeing and then we see the trends and stuff. And then, some people may shred that original data, but we keep it for quite a long time because we may go back later and say, Hey, there was this spike and I don't remember what was going on. You can go back to the raw data and go, oh, that's right. That was the day that he came in with a sore throat or something, and understand that better. So we keep that for a period of time. 

[00:11:31] The sixth thing is the follow up and the debrief plan, and making sure that we're revisiting things if things are working and if they're not working. We like to touch base formally each month, or more often if there's more crises even a quick, like two minute post escalation check-in sheet or just touching base with who was part of that, what worked, what didn't. Those are really crucial in deciding what direction we're going. So we're not just looking at hard data, points on a graph, but we're really talking to the people who are there 'cause you could have on the data, it shows one thing and you go talk to the person that says, yeah, it shows that, but he was really stressed out. I could see it in his face, although he wasn't exhibiting the behaviors that he normally does. And I think that's really important to know too. And also if you have several people within an escalation to be able to talk to both of them and making sure that you know what works for you, what didn't work, what do you need better next time? What kind of support would be help you more? Those are the kind of conversations that's really important. 

[00:12:27] And then on the big ideas, I think this gets missed a lot. A behavior plan that's part of an IEP, which they obviously are. Maybe we've done really well and the behavior's decreasing and we haven't really pulled up the plan or used it. And the IEP comes, so we just move along. We don't really analyze and make any changes to that behavior plan. So no less than once a year, even if behaviors are better, we need to be looking at that big plan and not just the fidelity checklist or the data, but looking at the plan and say what changes need to happen? Change the wording as the student grows. Maybe the wording for tantrum or meltdown changes more to dysregulation as they get older, whatever it is. Thinking their age in mind too. Adjusting the goals and the support when they hit that mastery. Removing strategies that aren't working or work so well, they don't really need 'em anymore. Testing out new ones, so making sure that at least during that iEP review time that you are analyzing the BIP and also then throughout the rest of the time, like we talked about, checking in on it. 

[00:13:25] Sami: Some of the interventions or things that we'll be working with, may be more restrictive initially, and then we're gonna be working on a fade plan, and just as we joked about how a staff member could win the Powerball move away, so could a student and their family. And so then that BIP is gonna follow with them. And they may start from the very beginning going, okay, this plan came in and we've gotta do all these things, not realizing that the growth had already occurred and now it's like everyone's stepping on each other. 

[00:13:50] Audra: And I think anybody who's received an IEP and or a BIP without knowing the student and then you get the student in, you're like, these do not match. That's really hard as they're receiving teacher to have that. So I think it's really important we think about ourselves sending our students off, even if you hear the day before a student is moving, just pull it up real quick. Even if you shoot an email out to the receiving team Hey, this hasn't been updated in six months 'cause the IEP, it's not time for that yet, but let me tell you what's been going on lately. It's just so appreciated. On least the receiving teacher's end. 

[00:14:22] Sami: Just a crazy off the cusp question, we're talking about it as if we're building this whole plan, and that's what this whole series has been from the FBA and the BIP. Could we just discuss for a second if we were in a position where someone just moved into our district and we received these documents, and where might we start? What would be the first initial steps that we would do when looking at an existing plan? 

[00:14:44] Audra: That's a great question, and I've always, and I think you've been a part of this too, when we receive something, I always contact that old school, I get permission first from admin, make sure they understand I'm doing that. But I make those contacts. If shared information documents need to be signed, and it's not usually a problem, but between districts, maybe they're coming from a private school and you'll need to make sure you have those shared consent forms. But connecting with those teachers and that team member to find out more because what you have in black and white could be very different than your day-to-day process with the students. So yeah, that's really important. 

[00:15:16] Sami: Reading through all the documents and then maybe scheduling some time for some specific student observations like you would from the very beginning of our process, just to see and get a feel for the student. Are you seeing any of the behaviors that were exhibited in the document in person?

[00:15:30] Audra: And then analyzing and checking in with your team. Do we accept this as is? Yeah, it looks accurate for everything I've talked about with the team, or do we need to create a new IEP or a new BIP from the beginning and to give yourself that two month time window or whatever we need to create something that's more accurate today.

[00:15:46] Sami: You could create a really easy data collection system to start tracking the behaviors that are marked in the documents and then be able to see, okay, is this warranted of the same document, or do we need to make some changes? And then you'd have some baseline to go off of anyway. 

[00:16:01] Audra: Great thoughts. Okay, five quick wrap up tips. Make your data doable. Short little tools, work best. Seeing things that everybody can understand. Don't make it too complicated, especially BCBAs that might be listening. Don't make it too complicated and convoluted for especially paras to take. Let's make it really simple and quick. 

[00:16:17] Two, assign your roles clearly. Don't have any mystery in who's collecting what or what it looks like. 

[00:16:23] The third thing, use those fidelity checklists. They're like a GPS for your plan. They're really gonna keep you on track and on the path to get where you want to go. And I found those to be really incredibly useful. 

[00:16:35] The fourth thing is share your progress with your families, early, often, not just when there's a problem, making sure they're hearing the good stuff going on. 

[00:16:42] And then the fifth thing. Keep the plan alive, review it, refine it, make it meaningful, making sure that we just not one and done. We've created the BIP, we've checked the box, but it's a living document for that student to progress. And it's also for us making sure that we're supporting, and this is the biggest thing, we're supporting the student where they need to go. And it's our role to make sure that the documents reflects that, and that our responsibility of the student is set in stone.

[00:17:07] Sami: Just remember that this is a person, this is a person who's learning and trying to figure things out for themselves. I think that's just a really important part of what we do is outside of all the papers we're dealing with people. 

[00:17:19] Audra: Yep. So that's it. That wraps up our series. Make sure you check our Facebook group, the Misfit Behaviorists. Grab all the freebies in there, the show notes also have the freebies. Generate ideas for us as we continue to go on with the Misfit Behaviorists podcast. We love talking with you, and we will see you guys again soon.

[00:17:36] Intro: Thanks for listening to the Misfit Behaviorists, and be sure to tune in next week for more tips and tricks. Don't forget to subscribe so you don't miss an episode.