16 Frequency Counts
Frequency Counts
When an educator wants to know how often or infrequent a behaviour is occurring, they will use a frequency count method to track a child’s behaviour during a specific timeframe. This method is used to gather information about a child’s interests, social interactions, play patterns, and temperamental traits. As the educator observes the children at play, a tally mark is made every time the noted behaviour or action occurs within a set timeframe. Frequency counts can be used to track undesirable or challenging behaviours as well as ideal or positive behaviours.
Here is what tally marks would look like as you document your observations.
Image Credit: Tally Marks by Benjamin D. Esham in the public domain via Wikimedia Commons
Collecting your Data
To create a frequency count, you must first decide on what social interactions, behaviours, interest areas, or types of play you want to monitor. You may decide to track a child during one focused activity or timeframe, or you may map out what a typical day might look like for a child and track all the interactions and experiences they engage in throughout the day. Either way, as you observe the child, you will make a tally mark every time they play in a specified area or display one of the behaviours you are focusing on.
Here are some examples of how you might use a frequency count to gather data:
- Sue has been hitting a lot lately and displaying other challenging behaviours. You want to track how many times she hits in a typical day along with any other challenging behaviours. You also want to track where the incidents are occurring – are there more incidents while inside the classroom or are things happening during outside play? You should look at when the incidents are occurring most often– are there more incidents earlier in the day, later in the day, at drop-off time, mealtime or at naptime? Lastly, you may want to track who Sue is socializing with and how she plays with others. Does Sue display a consistent play pattern (parallel play, cooperative play, onlooker play)?
- Thomas is new to the program and his mother wants to know how he is doing. You may want to observe which centres Thomas goes to most often throughout the day and track his interests. You may also want to track whether he plays alone or with other children.
- You and a child in your class are constantly butting heads. How can you create a supportive environment and provide a “goodness of fit”? You may need to track the child’s temperamental traits and observe how the child approaches activities and how they respond to social situations.
Organizing Your Data
After you have collected all the data for that timeframe, count the tally marks. What can you interpret from this data? What areas or action items received a high number of tally marks? What areas or action items received a low number of tally marks? Do you see any patterns? As you consider those questions, reflect on a plan of action that you might use to further support that child’s development.
Advantages
The advantages of using frequency counts include:
- Quick and easy to use, and no training is required
- Can be personalized or designed to gather specific baseline data (play patterns, challenging behaviours, social situations, temperamental traits)
- Provide immediate quantifiable data
- Ideal for tracking behaviours over time and for noting an increase or decrease of incidents
- Can be useful when planning behaviour modification strategies
- Data can be graphed or charted to find consistent patterns
- The advantages of using frequency counts include:
Disadvantages
The disadvantages of using frequency counts include:
- Do not provide rich details or context like anecdotal notes or running records
- There is no clear sequence of events regarding certain actions or behaviours
- Although the behaviour is tracked, information about the antecedent and the consequence is missing
- Do not provide qualitative evidence
- Results may be misleading
Here are some examples of a frequency count used to get a better idea of one child’s interests, social skills and behaviour.
