Contextual Coaching Versus Training Workshop for Assistants in Special Education.

Universidad de Zaragoza17 enrolled

Overview

Special Need Assistants/paraprofessionals serve an essential role in special education to support children with multiple disabilities, but they often lack adequate training and supervision. The study aims to examine the effects of the coaching program for assistants compared to a workshop outside working hours and evaluate the outcomes in students and assistants. The second aim is to measure fidelity implementation of coaching practices and if the intervention was participation-based.

This study addresses the training needs of assistants to minimize participation barriers of the students. The schools will be assigned to one of two groups: both groups will receive a 10 hours training workshop; only the intervention group will receive coaching one-to-one. The duration and number of coaching sessions will depend on the caregivers' time available, daily routines, and goals. Coaching sessions will be recorded for the assessment of treatment fidelity.

Study Type

INTERVENTIONAL

Allocation

NON_RANDOMIZED

Purpose

TREATMENT

Masking

SINGLE

Enrollment

Conditions

Disabled Persons Caregiver

Interventions

contextual one-on-one coachingBEHAVIORAL

Training workshop and coaching one-on-one

Trainig workshopBEHAVIORAL

Ten-hour training workshop.

Eligibility

Sex: ALLHealthy volunteers:

Medical Language ↔ Plain English

Inclusion Criteria assistants: * Special Need Assistant of students between 4-21 years of age. * Speak, read and comprehend Spanish. * Be available for workshop and one-on-one coaching. * Able to verbalize changes in their own performance or their students' participation. * Written consent. Exclusion Criteria assistants: * Have no students involved in the program. Inclusion Criteria students: * Present difficulties in Activities of Daily Living (ADLs). * Have an assistant involved in the study. * Informed consent signature (parents or legal tutors). Exclusion Criteria students: * Independence in activities of daily living. * 70 or more points in the Care Dependency Scale for Pediatrics (CDS-P).

Outcomes

Primary Outcomes

Change in The Canadian Occupational Performance Measure (COPM). Students

Caregivers identify activities that are problematic for the child. The caregiver rates the child's performance and satisfaction for each participation goal on a 10-point scale, (1=unable to perform, unsatisfied; 10= performs exceptionally well, extremely satisfied). Differences in scores pre-and post-intervention for both performance and satisfaction are determined independently. A 2-points change in these values is considered clinically meaningful.

Time frame: baseline- 3 month after intervention

Change in Goal Attainment Scaling (GAS). Assistants.

Clients identify goals and rate their performance on a 5-point Likert scale ranging from -2 (much less than expected) to +2 (much better than expected). In the baseline, clients can score -1 or -2, and the score "0" is the expected level of success. The 4-point Likert scale is used for quantifying importance (ranging from 0= nothing important to 3= really important) and difficulty (ranging from 0= easy to 3= very difficult). Afterwards, the goal's weight is calculated (importance\*difficulty). A mathematical formula allows computation to T-score with a mean of 50 and a standard deviation of 10.

Time frame: Baseline - 3 month after intervention

Secondary Outcomes

The Coaching Practices Rating Scale.

The Coaching Practices Rating Scale was utilized as a secondary outcome to measure the fidelity of coaching. Its 14 items are based on adults' learning characteristics and coaching practices to determine how the coach use these practices, on a 5-point Likert scale. The scale accepts the rating through video-tapes and has a high degree of construct validity and internal consistency.

Time frame: 12 month after intervention

Natural Environments Rating Scale (NERS)

The NERS describes eight categories: 1) setting; 2) activity; 3) type of activity; 4) engagement of child; 5) activity leader; 6) materials; 7) role of the caregiver; 8) the role of the professional. If there is no child-centred activity, grading is discontinued for the remaining categories. Only the last four categories are rated for an overall score that differentiated traditional or participation-based services.

Data from ClinicalTrials.gov

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