Summary: An incident report is the formal record you write when something out of the ordinary happens during a session, a behavior that caused harm, an injury, a medication error, an elopement, a disclosure of abuse. The skill the exam and your supervisor care about is the same one: writing what you actually saw, in plain measurable terms, without your opinions sneaking in. Get the facts down fast, keep them objective, and follow your agency's reporting chain.
Most of your documentation is routine. Session notes, data sheets, progress tracking. Incident reports are different. You write one when something happened that you'll want a clear record of later, and "later" might mean a parent meeting, a clinical review, an insurance claim, or in the worst case a legal proceeding. That's why the standard is higher.
Here's the mindset to bring to it. You're a camera, not a commentator. You record what happened so that someone who wasn't in the room can understand it without having to trust your interpretation. The moment your opinion shows up, the report gets weaker, not stronger.
Why these reports matter
It's easy to treat an incident report as paperwork you do after the real work is over. It isn't. A good one does several things at once.
It protects the client. Patterns only show up when events are documented consistently. If a kid elopes during the same transition three weeks running, that's a treatment problem your BCBA needs to see, and the incident reports are how she sees it.
That's the free preview of Incident Reports. The complete guide, plus all 851 practice questions and 3 full exams, is in the study pack and the book.