Autism, The Way Forward

A Self-Help Guide to Teaching Children on the Autistic Spectrum

Stephanie Louise

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2018
• Print ISBN: 9780367106072
• eBook ISBN: 9780429911149
• Topic: Psicologia
• Subtopic: Storia e teoria della psicologia

Specifically written for all those families who are unable to receive funding for their child's programme, and is an invaluable tool for new tutors coming into the field. The book is a step-by-step guide to setting up and running a home programme, which applies full communication in order to meet the needs of the child more fully. It guides the reader through the various stages, showing them what to include in their programme, when, why and how. Included in the book is a section on what to do when things go wrong on your programme. It also shows how the methodologies of behaviourism and psychotherapy are combined to give a synergetic effect, with all other methods supporting these by applying calming and performance-enhancing strategies.

Chapter 1
Behavioural intervention explained

One of the most important understandings of behavioural intervention is how to apply differential reinforcement, which means the gradual decreasing of reinforcement. An example of reinforcement is when your child makes a correct response to something you’ve asked him to do. You then follow this with a reward, which is known as a reinforcer.

Differential reinforcement. Verbal behaviourism

Example

Parent: “Sam, sit down” = request.

Child sits down = compliance.

Parent: “Thank you” = reinforcer.

In differential reinforcement the level of reinforcement is gradually decreased from “Whoopee!”—this being a high level of reinforcement that is aimed at giving the child a good physiological feeling, which corresponds with the correct response—to a slight nod of the head. However, to continue to give such a high level of reinforcement may result in the child becoming over-stimulated or super-saturated (unmotivated to respond at all, as he knows what’s coming), and so the reinforcer is then said to have lost its reinforcing value.

So, as a rule, work with lots of enthusiasm and begin to reduce your level of reinforcement as soon as possible. Remember to vary your use of language as much as possible (e.g. super, great, fantastic, terrific, and so on) until eventually a smile or an affirmative nod of the head suffices. This also serves to give the child feedback on his performance.

If a wrong response is given, apply silence. Look away, wait for a couple of seconds and then repeat the instruction.

Practitioners of verbal behaviourism employ something called “errorless teaching”. This means that any request given to the child is immediately followed through with the correct response. This is said to help facilitate a correct response from the child, who then knows what’s expected of him, and the instructor knows where the child is in terms of knowledge and can test this as follows:

Example

Instructor: “Hey, what’s your name?”

Child says nothing. Three seconds elapse.

Instructor: “Say ‘Tom’.”

Child: “Tom.”

Instructor: “Good.”

Instructor: “Hey, what’s your name?”

Child: “Tom.”

The instructor then immediately follows through with the reinforcement, such as saying “Clever child”. The child is then distracted for a couple of minutes before being asked the same question again:

Instructor: “What’s your name?”

Child: “Tom.”

The instructor then delivers huge reinforcement for this independent answer, such as throwing the child in the air while saying, “That’s right, your name is Tom.”

The reinforcement can be tightened up if need be to give a one second time lapse. However, try not to prolong this timed response for more than five seconds at this stage in the teaching.

The way that the question is asked of the child is an important factor and should vary as much as possible. As you can see from the example used above, the format of the question asked of the child varied immediately, it went from “Hey, what’s your name?” to “What’s your name?”

At a latter stage the instructor might say: “Are you Tom?” The instructor then immediately follows through with: “Say ‘Yes, I’m Tom’.” By so doing, he is giving the child the correct usage of language.

The aim of the exercise is to help the child use language correctly. This is done by means of modelling what is expected, and reinforcing it, and in so doing we are giving the child every chance of success and, as a consequence of this, we are also helping to raise his self-esteem. Children are more willing to try when they are receiving positive feedback.

The embedding of the child’s name into a sentence as soon as possible helps him to push his expectations of himself and this helps to keep the programme from stagnation, and the child from closing down through boredom.

This stretching of the teaching unit helps pitch the teaching at a realistic level, which can be reduced if necessary, and does not underestimate the child’s ability.

If the child is given the correct usage of language from the start, then his chances of imitating this (rather than sound bites of language, which appear artificial and robotic) are greatly improved.

So instead of responding with “Tom”, the instructor says: “Yes, you’re TOM,” embedding the target word “TOM” within the language structure straight away, while using voice inflection to emphasise the target word (in this case, “Tom”).

Remember, the key to a successful programme is to tailor it to suit the individual needs of the child.

Chapter 2
Constructing the learning environment

Apparatus

A small table and two chairs. The chairs should be small enough for the child to get up into and sturdy enough for the instructor to sit in.

Stimulus

Toys; small ones are usually easier for the tutors to manipulate, such as bubbles, balloons, and small pieces of fruit or chocolate, (about 1cm in size). Notice that we mentioned the healthier option first, but if your child likes chocolate, then go for it.

Please don’t beat yourself up about giving your child their favourite snack, as this is the key to any reinforcement, whatever works as a reinforcer on any particular day use it!

Reinforcement

Reinforcement should be given within one to five seconds after a response.

If the skill is one that we know the child knows, then we can give the child what is referred to as ‘processing time’, anything up to 10 seconds. However, when the skill is still on acquisition then the rule of one to five seconds applies.

Reinforcers, as the name suggests, should be just that: REINFORCING! To give an example, if on every occasion I saw you, you waved to me, then the chances are that I would wave back at you. However, if I did not respond to your waving by waving back, then more than likely you would cease waving to me.

If I had responded to your waving, then I would have been reinforcing your behaviour. Then it could be said that your behaviour had influenced my behaviour, which in turn influenced your behaviour.

If, however, I ignored your waving, and you then stop waving at me, then my behaviour would have influenced your behaviour, i.e. you stopped waving.

Extinction burst

The example given is of a worst-case scenario where the child is refusing to attend.

This is often the first thing to encounter in any teaching and, if dealt with correctly, should not present as a problem—if it does, this is a signal that something is wrong on the programme.

What to expect from an extinction burst:

Example

Your child is politely and firmly asked:

Instructor: “Come here.”

The child responds by immediately dropping to his knees, throwing himself on the floor and thrashing around, screaming and crying.

As yet nobody has done anything, except to request the child to “Come here”.

The child’s response is an example of an extinction burst in full throttle.

Ordinarily the adults present give in to the child or enter into a discussion with the child. This is not the way forward, as it allows for task avoidance and reinforces the negative behaviour.

The next time the child decides to refuse your request he will exhibit even more extremes of behaviour. Always try to follow through with whatever you’ve asked the child to do; if not immediately, then certainly before they are allowed to leave the teaching environment. Remember to give high reinforcement only for uncorrected responses.

So in dealing with any negative behaviour, start as you mean to go on: praise the best and ignore the rest. Set the ground rules at the start and you will save yourself a lot of time and effort.

How to deal with an extinction burst

Begin by asking the Child: “Come here.” If he refuses at this stage, test to see why. For example, if when you walk out of the room the child follows, you can be sure that he is looking for a reaction from you. If, however, they stay where they are, then the behaviour is aimed at task avoidance.

In this case, the instructor should lift the child into the chair (screaming and all) and act as though he were doing nothing wrong. He may kick, bite, or scratch, and probably will. Remember not to look at the child or speak to him while an extinction burst is in full swing; in fact, apply this rule whenever your child refuses a request.

All instructions should be followed through, even if this means carrying the child to the chair and holding him in the sitting position until he is sitting in the chair, this you do for a count of five, then reinforce this, and then let him go. This should proceed something like this:

Instructor: “Good sitting,” and holds the child in the chair for a count of five. Then you let the child go from the chair, which is reinforcing in itself. Let the child wander around for a while as they try to figure out what just happened.

A few minutes later, repeat the drama again, only this time hold the child in the sitting position for a count of 10. Repeat this process over and over, with short breaks in between. Try using different people, each slightly prolonging the time spent in the chair. When the child is released, they are then interacted with as normal, with no mention as to what just happened.

Remember to give the child no additional language, nor eye contact, until he is coming and sitting without protest. Within two or three days, and certainly no more than two weeks, your child should be presenting at the table perfectly.

When the extinction burst has been dealt with and the child is coming to the chair on the first request, then the instructor can reinforce the child with a small toy, or blow bubbles, maybe even pull a funny face—whatever entertains the child, but for only short bursts of time.

The instructor should keep control of the reinforcer at all times, and the child should only be allowed access to each reinforcer for short periods, which enables the reinforcer to remain reinforcing.

Special items of interest can be set aside for use on the programme, but these should not be made available to the child outside of therapy time.

The people involved in the programme are also ‘reinforcer’ and the child should seek them out for fun activities. Try to think of all the time spent with the child as teaching time. The guidelines for structured teaching should, whenever possible, be applied also in the natural e...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• ABOUT THE AUTHOR
• PREFACE
• INTRODUCTION
• Chapter 1: Behavioural intervention explained
• Chapter 2: Constructing the learning environment
• Chapter 3: Teaching a three-year-old
• Chapter 4: Teaching a four-year-old
• Chapter 5: Teaching a five-year-old
• Chapter 6: Teaching a six-year-old
• Chapter 7: Teaching seven–eight-year-olds
• Chapter 8: Play skills
• Chapter 9: The development of emotional health
• BIBLIOGRAPHY
• INDEX