- Action Planning
An action plan is used to organize the work that needs to be done by breaking down a more complex task into smaller steps. Action plans are often used to keep a team focused and to monitor progress over time.
- Applied Behavior Analysis
Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA) is an example of a positive support. People use this practice to change social behavior and improve lives. For instance, parents can use ABA to help their children learn new social skills. Teachers use ABA in classrooms with groups of students or with one child who needs more help to succeed to improve academic outcomes. ABA can help adults with disabilities live on their own in the community. In fact, this positive support can be used by people of all ages who want to change behavior. Businesses organize work settings using ABA so that employees can get more work done. Applied Behavior Analysis is also used to prevent challenging behaviors and improve quality of life. It is important to ask people how they use ABA since it can be used in so many different ways.
- Cultural Diversity
When groups of people in a community or organization share different cultural or ethnic backgrounds it is referred to as cultural diversity. A group of people representing a cultural group can share similar traits or interests. Examples include ethnicity, religion, language, sexual orientation, age, disability, health and wellness issues.
- Cultural Responsiveness Strategies
This term refers to the ability of people or organizations to learn about and become more aware of one’s own and other persons’ cultural values in ways that are respectful and contribute to a multicultural community. Being culturally responsive helps people to become more aware of implicit bias and systemic racism and to act in ways that can improve outcomes for people of color
- Culture of Safety
Providers who provide a Culture of Safety acknowledge that the work carries some high risk in the tasks the employee carry out. They also provide a culture that is blame-free, whereas people are able to report errors or near misses with our fear of reprimand or punishment. It encourages people across the organization to collaborate and seek solutions together in the spirit of safely for everyone. Organizations who are committed to a culture of safety commit resources to address safety concerns.
- Dialectical Behavior Therapy
A type of cognitive behavioral treatment originally used to support people with borderline personality disorder but that has been expanded to support people with a range of issues that are related to self-regulating behavior. People who learn to self-regulate learn to recognize and handle strong emotions. Dialectical Behavior Therapy or DBT has been used to address a number of mental health issues including post-traumatic stress, binge eating, depression and substance misuse. The main goal of dialectical behavior therapy is to learn four strategies: 1) develop skills to regulate emotions, 2) practice mindfulness skills that help people to live in the moment, 3) increase the ability to tolerate distress, and 4) expand relationship-building skills. Therapeutic settings for Dialectical Behavior Therapy involve working in groups to learn new behavioral skills, meeting for individual therapy, and engaging in coaching sessions.
- Groupthink
A way of thinking that one or more people adopt in a team that is based on conformity and avoidance of conflict related to diverse opinions. Team members avoid disagreement and may become convinced develop a sense that that the group is better than others without basing this judgement on fact. Groupthink can result in the team choosing to ignore the moral or ethical consequences of team decisions, as well as reduce critical thinking, poor decision making.
- Helping Relationship Questionnaire (HRQ)
Is a tool that promotes alliance between people providing support and the people receiving support. The person who provides the support recognizes that they have more to learn about who the relationship is working for the person receiving support. Then involves the person who provides supports, either on their own or with help from someone else identifies ways to improve the quality of the relationship, including dependability, trustworthiness, and genuine interest in the person receiving support.
- Home and Community-Based Services (HCBS)
Federal, state, local, and tribal governments develop and finance Home and Community-Based (HCBS) services to help ensure people across the lifespan can get long-term supports and services in their homes and communities instead of within institutional settings if that is their choice. These services help people live their lives as independently as possible. Examples of services include medication management support, assistance in preparing meals and shopping in the community, or receiving access to evidence-based practices that help people achieve the highest quality of life possible.
- Integrated Support Star (Charting the Lifecourse)
The integrated Support Star is a tool that can be used in several types of situations. It can be used for problem-solving real-life situations and issues. It is used to integrate, connect and leverage supports for a good life. This tool can be used with anyone.
- LifeCourse (Charting the Lifecourse)
A person-centered planning process is a framework with tools that can be used to help people organize ideas, values, and goals in order to problem solve and improve quality of life over time. Parents, case managers, teachers, students, and anyone interested in exploring ways to problem solve, navigate their life, advocate for changes in support can use Charting the LifeCourse.
- Lion’s Club
The Lion’s Club is an International Organization. This social club’s mission is to serve. Members join together to give their valuable time and effort to improve their communities across the world. Lion’s clubs often provide financial and human support for community projects.
- Marginalized Communities
Populations or groups of people who have be excluded from social, educational, economic, and other elements of general society. A marginalized community may be at risk for exclusion due to age, different abilities, health and wellness, race, gender identity, sexual orientation, language, and immigration status.
- One Page Descriptions
Information often one-page in length that captures important details about a person including sections to organize simple summaries. These sections can include what people like about me, what is important to me, and what you can do to support me. These descriptions have been used to support a variety of people across the lifespan who receive services and to support HCBS staff, county, or state professionals.
- Outcome Statements
Outcome statements in person-centered practices are broad value--based sentences that help to create a vision for the future. Outcome statements in these modules are organized into four areas: people supported, people providing services, the provider organization, and the community.
- PATH
PATH is a person-centered planning process created to support people with Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities identify a vision for their future. A PATH facilitator starts by talking with a person about their dream or vision around a specific area. The person will choose who they want involved in the planning process. The facilitator leads the person’s team through the steps involved in the PATH including discussing what is happening now, who should be enrolled in helping to make the dream a reality and mapping out the 3 and 6-month goals that will create momentum. Teams often use PATH process as a way to improve HCBS.
- Person-Centered Plan
A person-centered plan is a process that is used to create a plan for a positive and meaningful life for someone by building on his or her interests and strengths. There are different methods that can be used to help a person create their dreams for a better future. The person who asks for a person-centered plan chooses the people who will attend the meeting, the facilitator, and the location where the event is held. The goal of a person-centered plan is to create a set of actions that will help a person live their best life. There a many planning models that can be used to guide a meeting. However, the best person-centered planning process uses elements from different approaches to meet the needs of each person.
- Person-Centered Practices
Three are three elements of person-centered practices:
- Person-Centered Strategies that everyone can use to help people learn about what brings joy to someone and makes life worth living. These tools are also used to find out what is important to a person as well as understanding their needs for health, safety, and well-being.
- Person-Centered Planning is a process that is used to create a plan for a positive and meaningful life for someone by building on his or her interests and strengths. There are different methods that can be used to help a person create their dreams for a better future.
- Person-Centered Organizational Changes address how services and supports are planned and delivered. Changes that are made include fixing policies, adding ongoing opportunities for learning, and building community supports. Services for people across the lifespan are changed in ways that improve quality of life outcomes.
- Person-Centered Thinking
The foundational value-based skills that change the way in which someone sees another person that makes it possible for person-centered plans to be effective. Tools used in Person-Centered Thinking encourage active listening and relationship building and includes problem solving in ways that supports a deeper understanding of what is important to a person. The goal of person-centered thinking is to understand who someone is by their strengths and abilities, and what they can contribute.
- Positive Behavior Support
Positive Behavior Support is a framework used to improve the quality of a person’s life and prevent or decrease challenging social interactions. The tools and strategies used in positive behavior support encourage using social communication skills while changing social settings to prevent challenging behaviors. Positive behavior support is based on research from areas including biomedical and behavioral science that is driven by person-centered and culturally responsive values and uses the science of implementation to create sustainable and lasting using systems change.
- Positive Support Practices
The term positive support refers to practices that are: a) person-centered, family-centered, student-centered, and community-centered, b) evidence-based with research studies that show how effective an approach is and who benefits from the practice, c) sensitive and respectful to the unique culture of each person involved, d) adapted and improved over time using data to guide use, and e) often implemented with other practices within complex everyday settings.
- Psychological First Aid
This evidence-informed approach helps people who are experiencing disaster and related trauma. Eight actions in Psychological First Aid include: 1) initiate contact and engagement with people experiencing trauma, 2) address safety and comfort, 3) work to stabilize people who may be overwhelmed or disoriented, 4) gather information about current needs and concerns, 5) provide practical assistance, 6) connect people with social supports, 7) provide information on coping and stress reduction, and 8) link survivors with available services needed now or in the future.
- Qualitative Data
Information that is used to better understand the perceptions and emotional states of people and that seeks to capture the details of something that is being evaluated. Examples of qualitative measures include interviews with one person or groups, reviewing documents to assess whether changes have occurred, written descriptions of a situation or setting that occur in rich detail, or case studies and stories used to assess organize what is being learned by grouping into categories or codes and looking for themes.
- Quantitative Data
Information that is measured and results are shown using numbers to assess the amount of quantity of something. Examples of quantitative data include staff attrition numbers in a given year, the frequency of incidents that represent challenging social interactions, or how many people report improved quality of life scores using measures that define important quality of life domains (physical health, wellness, finances).
- Racial Equity
The way in which society distributes resources to everyone fairly so that people of different races are not treated in an unequal fashion. Structures, systems, policies, and decision-making processes are intentionally designed to promote equal opportunities for everyone.
- Resistance
People who are asked to change the way they work in order to apply new practices are not always eager to change their everyday routines and patterns. The term resistance refers to situations where someone is not interested in changing their work habits or actively adopting a new set of tools and strategies.
- Response to Intervention (RIT)
RTI is an educational practice that involves early identification of the academic and social supports needed for all students in school. An increasing continuum of interventions is provided to students needing more educational and behavioral support to ensure academic success. The RTI model has three tiers of academic interventions that increase in intensity across each tier. RTI involves effective instruction for all students and universal screening in general education classrooms. Students struggling with academic goals are provided with interventions based on what they need to improve learning outcomes. Student progress is monitored on an ongoing basis with each child receiving the needed intensity and duration of instruction based on the data that are being collected to monitor and improve progress.
- Tools of Choice
A universal social skills training to teach staff and family members key strategies for building positive reinforcing interactions. This training was initially developed to support families providing foster care and has been used in other settings including supporting people with Intellectual and developmental disabilities.
- Trauma-Focused Cognitive Behavior Therapy
Traumatic life experiences such as child or domestic abuse, natural disasters, or other negative life events can have a lasting impact on a person’s health and emotional wellbeing. Trauma-Informed Cognitive Behavior Therapy is an evidence-based practice that addresses this issue. Trauma-Focused Cognitive Behavior Therapy is a positive support that teaches children and adults skills to recognize negative or unhealthy thoughts associated with past experiences and to engage in stress management and coping strategies when these thoughts occur. This approach can also include teaching new skills for parents and caregivers of children involved in therapy. A family therapy approach is used to help recognize family dynamics, teach new parenting skills, support stress management for both child and family members, and work on improving communication skills.
- Trauma-Informed Care/Trauma-Focused Care Philosophy
Traumatic life experiences such as child or domestic abuse, natural disasters, or other negative life events can have a lasting impact on a person’s health and emotional wellbeing. Trauma-Informed Cognitive Behavior Therapy is an evidence-based practice that addresses this issue. Trauma-Focused Cognitive Behavior Therapy is a positive support that teaches children and adults skills to recognize negative or unhealthy thoughts associated with past experiences and to engage in stress management and coping strategies when these thoughts occur. This approach can also include teaching new skills for parents and caregivers of children involved in therapy. A family therapy approach is used to help recognize family dynamics, teach new parenting skills, support stress management for both child and family members, and work on improving communication skills. Trauma-Focused Care Philosophy refers to the core values and messages that describe why it is important for organizations to be sensitive to the past trauma most people have in their lives.
- Wraparound Planning
Parents of children and adults with mental health needs and challenging behavior are often expected to communicate with a number of different service systems. Each of these services require parents to complete forms, attend meetings, and respond to requests related to services. Juvenile justice, children and family services, special education, mental health, and developmental disabilities are all examples of these different services. The wraparound plan is mean to help youth and their parents by improving service coordination. Wraparound planning is a team-based approach that is child-and family-driven. Team members include natural supports (friends, family members, and people who know the child or young person well). Individuals from formal supports might include a parole officer, counselor, psychiatrist, or special education teacher. The goal of wraparound is to assess the child and family strengths in order to build a plan of support that will improve quality of life.