How Can I Provide Choice-Making Opportunities Throughout the Day?

Choice options can be broken down into seven categories. The Model of Choice Diversity (Brown, Belz, Corsi, & Wenig, 1993) lists these choice options as follows:

• Between Activities (choice among different activities)
• Within Activities (choice of materials for a given activity)
  
• Refusal (choice to refuse an activity)
  
• Who (choice of the person the learner wants to work with)
  
• Where (choice of the location of the activity)
• When (choice of what time the activity will occur)
  
• Terminate (choice to end an activity)

Read the following example to see how easy it is to overlook opportunities for choice-making!

It was bath time. The only option Maggie was given was the choice between the bathtub or the shower. Although a choice is provided, it has been limited in at least seven ways:

1. If Maggie wanted to use the purple soap instead of blue soap, her within activities choice was denied.
   
2. If Maggie wanted to have a snack at this time instead of bathing, choosing between activities was denied.
   
3. If Maggie did not want to bathe at all, her choice to refuse was denied.
   
4. If Maggie wanted to get out of the bath before shampooing her hair, her choice to terminate the activity was denied.
   
5. If Maggie wanted to her mom to help her instead of her big sister, her choice of with whom to participate was denied.
   
6. If Maggie wanted to bathe in her mom’s bathtub, her choice of where the activity occurred was denied.
   
7. If Maggie wanted to take a bath at a later time, her choice of when was denied.

Meet Jeff!

Jeff is one of Maggie’s classmates. He rarely interacts with his peers and only participates in activities when prompted to do so. The staff thought that if they taught Jeff to engage in more choice-making activities, he might become more motivated and participate more in class activities. This would naturally lead to increased peer interactions as well.

The following table illustrates how the Choice Diversity Model was used to explore Jeff’s daily opportunities for choice-making.

Choice Diversity Work Sheet

Instructor: Abby	Learner: Jeff
Date of Review: 2/12	Setting: 3rd grade
Instructions: Indicate the form(s) of choice that could occur in each box. Leave box blank if choice is not relevant.

Routine	Within	Between	Refusal	Who	Where	When	Terminate
Academics	Materials	Choice of activities		Choose study buddy	Which seat		"Finished" when done
Snack	Drink, food, cup		"No"	Choose who to sit by	Desk or table	Before or after recess	"Finished" when done
Free Play	All available	Reading books, board games, cards		Choose two peers			"Finished" when done
Gym	Basketball or volleyball			Choose four team members	On blacktop or grass		"Finished" when done

Check out HERE to find Choice Diversity Worksheet that you can individualize for your own learner!