The title of this blog comes from a handwritten note I received after purchasing the Portable Operant Research and Teaching Lab (PORTL) manual and an educational kit. The note read: “Thank You for Playing PORTL!”. Isn’t that a great note? Simple and powerful, as it carries the message blending learning with fun. PORTL is a game that simulates an operant chamber and experimental subject, and it is used for teaching and research. If you don’t know PORTL, you’re up for something great, and if you do, please hang in there; would you? This blog is also for you.
I have been hearing and reading about PORTL for a while now. I have colleagues who use it for teaching (graduate and undergraduate students) and research. I have also attended conference presentations about PORTL, but it is this Spring 2025 that I will be trying it for the first time in two of my undergraduate courses on behavior principles and introduction to applied behavior analysis. I’m excited and nervous about this first try, but it is really when you do the thing that you learn, right? I’m sure that students once again will teach me how to teach and that we will learn PORTL together.

PORTL – What is It?
“PORTL is a tabletop game that provides an interactive environment for learning about behavior principles and investigating behavioral phenomena. It is played using a collection of small objects, a clicker to select behavior, and small blocks as reinforcers.”
“PORTL had its beginnings in another game, called GENABACAB, which was developed by English dog trainer Kay Laurence. About a decade ago, Laurence taught this game to Dr. Jesús Rosales-Ruiz and his graduate students. The students started playing the game with each other and were hooked. They also began modifying the game to create an apparatus that could be used for teaching and research.”
The two quotes above were directly extracted from the website Behavior Explorer (https://behaviorexplorer.com/articles/portl-intro/). Dr. Mary Hunter and Dr. Jesús Rosales-Ruiz are co-creators of PORTL. The website has great resources including videos to get you started on how to use PORTL.
Check out the video embedded below titled: An introduction to PORTL – Portable Operant Research and Teaching Lab (An awesome shaping game!):
Why Use It?
One of the reasons for incorporating PORTL is that commonly, many universities and colleges may not have access to a laboratory due to its high cost (Hunter & Rosales-Ruiz, 2023; Rosales-Ruiz & Hunter, 2016). Several alternatives to a laboratory (with non-human animals as subjects) have been created and documented as viable and effective in demonstrating and illustrating behavior principles to students of behavior science (see Elcoro & Trundle, 2013). PORTL not only provides that live (not virtual) experience, but it also low cost.
As I prepare these sessions of PORTL for my classes I came across two seemingly contradictory terms that have been used to describe the experience of playing/learning with PORTL: FUN and FRUSTRATION. Students may have fun in this interactive activity, while also may experience frustration. In PORTL, students work in pairs (learner and teacher), the teacher uses a clicker and tokens as reinforcers, and speaking to each other (or touching) is not allowed. Sessions are consist of 10 trials followed by a break during which the learner has the opportunity to decsribe what they were doing and how they felt in the session. This break serves as an assessment for both learner and teacher, as the learners feedback may help the teacher modify their strategies. In this situation, fun and frustration may coexist, which brings an opportunity for coorperating and also for developing empathy and adopting a compassionate approach to behavior change (Scallan & Rosales-Ruiz, 2023).
A Call for Being More Constructional and Compassionate
Building compassion entails identifying suffering and experiencing empathy (Scallan & Rosales-Ruiz, 2023). An emphasis on building skills is in line with a constructional approach as described by Goldiamond and more recently revisted by Scallan and Raosales-Ruiz, who go into detail on defining compassion and constructional in behavior analysis. With PORTL we can construct, we can build repertoires on how develop empathy for one another. In playing PORTL, the learner and teacher have potential for developing reciprocal compassion as playing occurs.
Relatedly, the co-creators and user of PORTL are seeing playing as equal to learning. This is so valuable for teachers and students, for pedagogy! As mentioned earlier, in PORTL, there are two roles: teacher and learner. The idea is that students exchange roles throughout the experience. Teachers implement procedures and learners interact with objects on the table and earn tokens (that function as reinforcers). PORTL allows for a dynamic exchange into teacher and learner as well as opportunities for data collection and to learn about how the learner feels with this experience.
More Literature on PORTL
In addition to some of the reasons to play PORTL outlined above, there is more literature to further guide its incorporation into the classroom. For example, Goodhue et al. (2019) described in detail how to incorporate PORTL into an undergraduate course on introduction to behavior analysis. In their article Goodhue et al. described PORTL (as well as how to create one), outlined the eight practical rule to play PORTl, shared data sheets, and exercises for two courses on behavior principles.
I am eager to try PORTL this semester and would love to learn about your experience and interest in incorporating this tool and approach to your teaching and learning opportunities. I am thankful for colleagues cited in this blog who are developing tools that makes the incorporation of PORTL easier for us. I am also grateful to have colleagues with experience using PORTL who have shared their experiences using it in the classroom with me. Also, I want to acknowledge the Center for Excellence in Learning, Teaching, Scholarhsip, and Service at Framingham State University for providing the funds to purchase the PORTL manual and kits that I will be using this Spring. Let’s play and be thankful!

References
Behavior Explorer https://behaviorexplorer.com/portl/
Elcoro, M. & Trundle, M. (2013). Student preferences for live versus virtual rats in a learning course. International Journal for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning, 7(1), Article 16 https://doi.org/10.20429/ijsotl.2013.070116
Goodhue, R. J., Liu, S. C., & Cihon, T. M. (2019). Incorporating the portable operant research and teaching laboratory into undergraduate introduction to behavior analysis courses. Journal of Behavioral Education, 28(4), 517–541. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10864-019-09323-y
Hunter, M. E., & Rosales-Ruiz, J. (2023). The PORTL Laboratory. Perspectives on Behavior Science, 46(2), 355–376. https://doi.org/10.1007/s40614-023-00369-y
Rosales-Ruiz, J., & Hunter, M. (2016). PORTL: Your portable skinner box. Operants, 4, 34-36. https://www.bfskinner.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/OPERANTS_Q4_2016.pdf
Scallan, C.M., Rosales-Ruiz, J. (2023) The constructional approach: A compassionate approach to behavior change. Behavior Analysis in Practice. https://doi.org/10.1007/s40617-023-00811-2