For many students it is best to select certain issues that are important to address and certain issues that are best ignored until the other behaviors are under control. For example, a teacher may choose to work with a student to decrease physical aggression, put downs and getting out of seat while ignoring pencil tapping and calling out answers out of turn.
Success is more likely when teachers focus on two or three important behaviors to change.
Behaviors that are motivated by attention seeking may be good choices for planned ignoring. For example if a student calls out answers to questions without raising her hand, the teacher might call on another student who was raising her hand. The teacher may at a later time remind the whole class that he calls only on students who have their hands raised during whole group instruction. It is often imortant for the class to agree that they will not give attention to certain student behaviors. It is also important to ignore certain behaviors, but don't ignore the student.