The Effect of Preteaching Reading Skills on the On-Task Behavior of Children Identified With Behavioral Disorders Michelle Beck and Matthew K. Burns University of Minnesota Matthew Lau Minneapolis Public Schools ABSTRACT: Research has consistently demonstrated that preteaching activities led to increased academic outcomes and increased academic outcomes improve behavioral variables. The purpose of this study was to determine the effect of a preteaching intervention on time spent on task for children identified with a behavioral disorder (BD). A single-subject multielement design found that time on task during reading instruction increased after participating in a preteaching intervention for 2 children identified with a BD. This finding suggests an effective intervention with clearly differentiated data. However, the percentage of intervals that the students were on task increased to only approximately 66%. Limitations and directions for future research are discussed. & An estimated 489,000 students are classi- fied with an emotional disturbance (National Center for Education Statistics, 2004), which is often associated with aggressive behavior, poor academic and social functioning, and disruptive off-task behavior (Kehle, Bray, Theodore, Zhou, & McCoach, 2004). The relationship between behavioral problems and academic difficulties is complex. Perhaps some students with behavioral disorders (BDs) exhibit academic difficulties prior to being evaluated for BD and their frustration with academic tasks is linked to off-task and disruptive behavior (Huesmann, Eron, & Yar- mel, 1987). Other students with challenging behaviors may exhibit the behavioral concerns prior to their academic difficulties. This type of student may enter school without the appro- priate social-emotional skills to successfully participate in the educational process and therefore fall further behind academically as a result (Talbott & Coe, 1997). It appears that academic difficulties and disruptive behaviors form a cycle of aversive behavior and academic failure (Cullinan, Osborne, & Epstein, 2004). The result of this cycle of failure can be educationally cata- strophic in that more than 50% of students diagnosed as emotionally or behaviorally disordered drop out of school (U.S. Depart- ment of Education, 2002). Yet most interven- tions for children with BDs tend to focus on managing the behavioral difficulties and fre- quently ignore any academic deficits (Rivera, Al-Otaiba, & Koorland, 2006). Reading is perhaps the most important academic skill a child can learn, and failure to do so could have lifelong negative implica- tions (Snow, Burns, & Griffin, 1998). More- over, reading interventions for children with behavioral difficulties could be especially important given their link to improved social competence. Previous research consistently found that reading interventions with children identified with BDs led to improved reading and behavioral outcomes (Lane, 1999; Lane et al., 2002; Lane, O’Shaughnessy, Lambros, Gresham, & Beebe-Frankenberger, 2001; Locke & Fuchs, 1995; Spencer Scruggs, & Mastropieri, 2003; Sutherland & Snyder, 2007; Wehby, Falk, Barton-Arwood, Lane, & Cooley, 2003). In fact, reading interventions resulted in small to moderate effects on social variables as well, which were approximately the effect size values for interventions explicitly designed to address social outcomes (Wanzek, Vaughn, Kim, & Cavanaugh, 2006). The link between behavioral outcomes and academic skills was first suggested when Gickling and Armstrong (1978) demonstrated that children taught at an instructional level, using Betts (1946) classic definition of the Behavioral Disorders, 34 (2), 91–99 February 2009 / 91