Definitions
Reinforcement
Example: Providing a preferred item or activity after the child finishes a task or has really good behavior. This helps them learn that they get good stuff after doing these things!
Prompting (with examples of types)
Helping your child to answer correctly, like modeling the right answer, pointing to it, giving them hints, or guiding their hand.
Explain to a parent why you gave their kid edibles.
Sometimes when your child is not as interested in other motivators, favorite snacks can help keep them learning and motivated. If you have any other snacks you'd prefer us to use, please let me know!
Describe "trial" and a "trial block".
A trial block is when we work on the same type of skill 10 times in a row, in order to give your child many opportunities to receive feedback. A trial is each individual opportunity within that trial block.
Explain behavioral momentum so that a parent may get their child to comply with a task at home.
Example: When trying to get Bobby to put away a toy, you can first ask him to do other very easy things you know he will do, followed by the harder thing. For example, you could ask him to touch his head, say "ah", then put away the toy. This helps build momentum!
Antecedent
Anything that happens before they engage in a behavior. For example, you asking them to put away their toys.
Psychological flexibility
The ability to be able to deal with whats going on that we can't change in order to do what's important to us.
Explain a token system
A token system is when we teach the child to earn a certain number of tokens, such as a star or sticker chart for good behavior or finishing tasks. When they earn a certain number, they can exchange them for a favorite thing to do or item to have.
A parent asked you why we are training a program with a bunch of arbitrary symbols.
When we use arbitrary symbols, we are teaching skills related to learning processes, not necessarily specific skills like colors, numbers, etc. By using arbitrary symbols we are able to see if your child is truly learning these processes, since they have not been exposed to them before!
Defusion
In our sessions we teach that our thoughts are only words. Because our thoughts are only words we can read them, sing them, say them really silly, which helps us separate our thoughts from these things stuck inside our head. For example, when you say a word over and over again it starts losing its meaning. We can do the same thing with tricky thoughts!
Consequence
Anything that happens after they engage in a behavior. This could be like a high five or even taking something away.
Differential reinforcement with example and why.
This is when we provide reinforcement for some behaviors, but not for others. For example, we will provide your child the iPad when they are sitting nicely in their chair but not when they are anywhere else in the room. We will do this so he learns that sitting nicely earns the iPad.
Because we are only able to work with your child 4 hours per week, we work at the table to be able to work on as many skills as we can using the small amount of time we have. By working at the table, we are able to get in many skills at a time.
A parent is at the end of their 2 years at LCD and wants to know if their child can join the MAC. You know that their child is not yet ready to join MAC based on their language skills. Explain this.
The MAC might be a great future option, but I think there are some areas that Bobby may want to work on before he is ready. The MAC sessions require a lot of understanding of metaphors and being able to talk about thoughts and emotions. We can provide you a list of skills to give to his other therapists/school teacher to work on to prepare him if you would like him to join the MAC in the future.
Self-As-Context
This one can be really tricky. But self-as-context is being able to be flexible when thinking about our own selves, in that we learn from our experiences but we are NOT our experiences. For example, we might fail a test but that doesn't make us a failure. We just learn that we might need to do different things to prepare better next time.
A Function of behavior
The reasons why the child keeps behaving in certain ways.
ACT
ACT is a therapy we use to help kids learn about being in the moment, understanding what's important them, not letting their thoughts or feelings get in the way, and behaving in ways that get them closer to things they like.
Explain why their child's is going through an extinction burst. You can use a specific example.
Example: Your child has been used getting out of a task for flopping on the ground. Because we are not taking the task away and having him continue on the ground, he is learning to test his limits a bit. We are working to be consistent so that he learns he will be able to have the task taken away as soon as he completes it.
A parent asks you for recommendations for dealing with challenging behavior at home.
It is tricky to provide suggestions without observing it happening at home. If we see a similar situation here at sessions, I would be more than happy to explain how we respond. You can also talk to Becky if you would like some other resources.
Stimulus equivalence and why we use it.
Stimulus equivalence happens when we teach a few things and the child is able to infer, without us teaching them, how they are all connected. You can think of it like an equation, if A=B, and B=C, then C would also equal A. A lot of times children with autism struggle to see that connection between C=A. This is what we work on.
ABA therapy
A science based therapy that works on creating an environment and consequences for success to improve helpful behaviors such as skills, and decrease unhelpful behaviors.
PEAK Assessment and Curriculum
PEAK is an assessment that helps us understand what skills your child already has and what skills we will need to work on related to language and cognition. The PEAK curriculum helps us to teach specific skills, work on generalization, and help with teaching more complex skills such as problem solving, perspective taking, and logical reasoning.
Example: All children are different and learn at different paces. Especially with autism, behaviors and skills look very different. Some children require more support than others, and it takes time and consistency to start to really learn. I can have my supervisor talk to you about options outside of the LCD Clinic/MAC if you are wanting additional services.
A parent says: "I went to the Temple Grandin talk at SIU last week and she talked about the importance of incorporating sensory integration into my child's therapy. Is this something we can do here, or is there somewhere I can go to get more sensory integration therapy?" Respond.
That's really neat that you got to see her talk. How exciting that SIU made that a free opportunity. Kids with autism often really enjoy or dislike certain sensory things. For example, Bobby really loves the spinning light toy we have. We make sure to provide Bobby the opportunity to play with light toy after he finishes his work, since he is often motivated to work for it. Although sensory integration has gotten quite popular, there doesn't seem to be a lot of research showing its effectiveness in autism treatment, which is why we do not incorporate its methods here. You may think about incorporating Bobby's favorite sensory toys or activities into rewards at home for completing tasks if those seem to be of interest to him!
Transformation