Re: teaching in the natural environment (long)

[Guest guest]

Pac1363@... wrote:>

> One

> thing we do is go for walks. Grant loves to walk so as we go I have him tact

> trees, grass,dirt etc. I may say what are some things you see outside and

> point to things around us. I constantly comment on what we see. We are

> working on a " what do you see?'' program at the table and I work to talk

> about stuff in that way when we are out of the room. One of the best places

> we do therapy is at the store. There are tons of stuff to tact. You can

> easily build categories " name some fruits? " while you are in the produce

> department. You can even sneak in RFFC. " something red, that is sweet, that

> you eat is? " (holding up an appple.

This is really great therapy! This type of teaching is so critical for

success, and yes the 24/7 is key. We started our program way before the

NET thing exploded, close to five years ago. But I have to say in

defense of the more typical Lovaas therapy, I was able to pick up on the

NET - generalization stuff from reading certain books. LMHYV for one-

this was how Maurice spent her days. ANd if you have ever read

" Autism - Tragedy to Triumph " about one of the UCLA recovered kids you

remember the Mom talking about taking her son to the fabric store and

practicing colors. She also included him in cooking , chores and

everything that she did around the house. In addition she did sit down

table drills so she would be with the program. So I guess I just started

to do this from the beginning.

We also never let Reagan have anything she wanted without manding for it

by at least giving us eye contact. Once she could say the word , she had

to say it. We gradually worked up to " I want ---- " . We tried to keep

anything reinforcing to Reagan out of her reach unless she " earned " it.

While difficult, Christmas toys and favorite foods all monitored and

rationed differentially, this was super critical.

We did as these folks did with actions, and tacting - Many, many times

each day " What are you , I , he, she , they doing? " If Reagan did not

know we would ask again and prompt. If it was not a mastered or even

introduced item we would ask anyway with a 0 second delay prompt. (We

were able to do this very early on as Reagan's echoic ability developed

very quickly.)

Even when a program was fairly new we constantly " generalized " out of

the chair. With people id adding " Who is ----? " questions. We took

pictures of all the people Reagan knew doing many different things and

then brought in the sd " Who is -----ing? " At the same time we worked on

this in the environment, along with " What's Daddy doing? - sleeping " Who

is sleeping? - Daddy "

At one point , because we didn't have the ABLLS and knowledge of

teaching RFFC, we actually added a generalizing functions drill to our

log book in which the therapists were required to go out into other

rooms and basicall do RFFCs - " Go touch the thing we put dirty dishes

in " " Where do we put dirty clothes? " " Can you find something you talk

on? " etc etc etc. It was not until we did this that all this came

together.

During the hours that I had my preschool class (I taught preschool at

home) there were many many opportunities to practice NET. At snack time,

teaching joint attention by having Reagan pass out snacks to the others

and each time saying " Here, Tony. Here ,Devon "

I also took tremendous advantage of the opportunity to work on

generalizing imitation skills, describing skills and numerous other

skills in circle time. As well as practicing fine motor and gross motor

skills throughout the day.

Setting up a playgroup with peers is a great thing to do as soon as your

child has the basic compliance to attend to what is going on.

At this point in time Reagan is six and a half, though functionally

recovered she still has large deficits in verbal reasoning which we work

on in the natural environment as well as at the table (because we

actually do sit there sometimes in order to do stuff like homework and

eating meals ) This morning we worked on building a puzzle ( a big

weak area as it involves a lot of problem solving -Reagan never had

splinter skills for puzzles) I have to use trials to work on the

language of reasoning with Reagan. It went something like this - Target-

Lining up straight edge pieces. Reagan would just take a piece with no

straight edge and try to connect it to an edge piece. Or she would take

two straight edge pieces and try to connect them with the straight edges

opposing each other. First we would find the edge of the piece " Reagan

where is the straight edge? " P to run her finger over the edge if she

didn't touch it immediately. Pick out several random pieces " Does this

piece have a straight edge? " She answers yes or no. " Point to the

straight edge " If it had one.

Where do the straight edge peices go? " p- Next to the other straight

edge pieces. If she tried to place a piece wrong then I would ask- " Why

can't you put that there? " and p - " because it doesn't have a straight

edge " If she tried to place a straight edge piece in the middle we would

go through the whole echoicly prompted dialogue about straight edge

pieces going next to other straight edge pieces. By the time the puzzle

was finished she had that response down. BTW, I accept any response she

comes up with on her own that is correct and actually reinforce it more

strongly. The goal is for her to construct sentences that employ verbal

reasoning - a very difficult task for Reagan.

I used the built in reinforcement of Pokemon (it was a Pokemon puzzle)

like this. Since Reagan wanted to talk about each Pokemon guy and would

have spent a bit too much time looking at the pieces instead of building

then I would everyso often ask a question about the character so she had

the opportunity to talk about them.

I only detail this drawn out procedure because Reagan is a very high

functioning child who is not doing any " formal " therapy at this time.

However, her life is therapy as it has always been , and sometimes she

needs more structured teaching than others. She can pick up new info and

concepts at school, but since verbal reasoning is so hard we have to use

a lot of prompting , multiple exemplars, and reinforcement. Once you

know how to do this at the table there is little to no difference

between running " trails " at the table or embedding them in the natural

environment. As Isabel pointed out, depending on the neccessary

materials and the goals in your program , there is some preplanning

involved. But there also arise in the course of any given day a ton of

" teachable moments " which we should all learn to take advantage of.

These are the moments when you can see that the child's interest in

something is giving you the gift of strong reinforcement. If you look

for such moments and capitalize on them you will learn to teach in the

natural environment. Lynette

[Guest guest]

After reading Kat and Lynette's comments I wanted to add a few thoughts . .

..

I realize after reading their posts and mine again that I failed to step

back and look at the bigger picture. In my initial post I think I may have

made out NET to be " rocket science " . Truth is that to us, in a way it was.

When we began I had very little knowledge of how to engage my daughter. By

learning about DTT and use its format in natural situations, I learned how

to work with her. By using reinforcers and wonderful teaching tools

(errorless learning, shaping, prompts, etc.) I learned that a) I could use

reinforcers to capture and maintain her attention . . . that I could use

motivating situations to teach new skills .. . and c) that after we taught

her to play with some toys I could use these now a springboard to teach

other skills naturally - these are now reinforcers.

When we began she also did not interact with the environment much and

preferred to be alone most of the time. She did not seek our attention, but

now that she does these two and I know how to do trials, I find it much

easier to engage her in a way that I know aids her learning naturally.

I think what we find as we work with kids in the natural environment is

that they may have an easier time or not learning. I think the tougher time

they have, the more you need to create structured NET sessions where you

focus on some specific targets and use reinforcers that may not be directly

related to the learning may come into play. Our daugther has started paying

attention to a doll house that we have. Because she does this daily (it's

lying around her playroom) when she migrates to it, I step in and do some

trials with her. I have a set of goals and a plan of what I want her to

learn . . . and I use verbal and physical reinforcers and at times others

like edibles. But I wait for her to go to the dollhouse . . . and even

within my gameplan I pay attention to her reactions because sometimes I want

to work on receptive commands, imitation, eye contact , etc. but she is

babbling like a maniac and I decide to focus on this and reinforce it

instead. I just babble away myself and take her babbling as if she's

" talking " and I label all that I do. But sometimes there's little babbling

so I work on getting her to put the furniture in the rooms, the baby in the

crib . . . imitation skills and such.

I know Kat used the word " precise " in her post and I thinks the answer

to that is that it is as precise as the child needs. As Patty and Lynette

explained, if the child responds to generalization and new skill acquisition

based on a walk or a typical daily routine (putting the dishes away) then

that's great, as that IS the ultimate goal and I think at this point the

planning/organization is minimal, if any.

Also, I also know that because my daughter still does not speak, a alot

of our interactions include materials that she manipulates and that takes

some planning/organization on my part . . . but many times during the day we

work very losely . . . because she comes to me or initiates an interaction

and it's a moment you can't lose. She has begun to like tickling and

bouncing on my lap, and so I use those a lot. She also still needs to work

on improving her vocalizations, so that's always a goal that I can easily

pull " out of a hat " if she catches me w/o materials and wants to engage.

The " teachable moments " that Lynette referred to were a topic of several

of 's remarks during the workshop I attended. And as Lynette mentioned

they are everywhere. This is why when I asked Dr. P. how many hours I

needed to work with my daughter he explained that they do not view

intervention in terms of hours. It is the 24/7 we all talk about, the

trying to engage her constantly. I also asked about letting her " go play "

and their attitude is that some much can be learned during play naturally,

that we should be part of that as well.

Sooo, it's doesn't have to be the rocket science I described. At one

point I said " this is VERY hard to do " and should have added " to me " because

it was <LOL>.

All the best!

Isabel

ipawling@...

[Guest guest]

Snipped for space,

I think the tougher time

>they have, the more you need to create structured NET sessions where you

>focus on some specific targets and use reinforcers that may not be directly

>related to the learning may come into play. Our daugther has started paying

>attention to a doll house that we have. Because she does this daily (it's

>lying around her playroom) when she migrates to it, I step in and do some

>trials with her. I have a set of goals and a plan of what I want her to

>learn . . . and I use verbal and physical reinforcers and at times others

>like edibles. But I wait for her to go to the dollhouse . . . and even

>within my gameplan I pay attention to her reactions because sometimes I want

>to work on receptive commands, imitation, eye contact , etc. but she is

>babbling like a maniac and I decide to focus on this and reinforce it

>instead. I just babble away myself and take her babbling as if she's

> " talking " and I label all that I do. But sometimes there's little babbling

>so I work on getting her to put the furniture in the rooms, the baby in the

>crib . . . imitation skills and such.

>they are everywhere.

>

>

Isabel,

To me it is hard, maybe not rocket science, but then again I have zilch

interest in rocket science. LOL I have an obsessive amount of interest in

ABA in all its forms. However, I find this twice as hard.

My son is much older, EXTREMELY interactive, but he has almost no play

skills, mild interest at best, and is very much on the go. Trying to find a

balance between age appropriate skills and teaching, structure, teachable

moments, etc., is making me feel very helpless, useless even. Because,

today we watched him come to us many times, turn away and give up because

he did not want to try and vocalize and mand for something, and stim in the

living room by himself, and I realized that trying to do this stuff is

hard. Tickling is easy. All of the engagement stuff is easy for us, but I

do not understand this working well without intense structure any more than

Greenspan would have worked or works for us now.

I guess I am freaked. The moments are not everywhere for me, since I feel

we are wrestling with trying to get Isaac to attend to something new or

different and TALK, and stuff. He is doing great on DTT, but then we sit

down, get out the fire engine and try to get him to look at the truck and

it's little man climbing up and he BOREDLY pretends to have the man climb

the ladder after we imitate and he even drives the truck a bit and looks

like he just drank spoiled milk. LOL

As people have noted many times, we are very lucky, BUT, it is also the

bane of our lives that my son is very compliant for the most part, rarely

truly tantrums, and can be passively disinterested and participate so

modestly, we end up feeling apologetic to him!!!

Jennie

[Guest guest]

Dear Folks,

Successful ideas needed, I guess. The consultant gave us some ideas for

outside, like the playground. We would use PECS to have him ask for a

slide, swing, merry go round, etc. And that is manding, and then try and

get him to model or approximate any of those words, but also since he can

occasionally say MORE or AGAIN allow those words, but try harder for nouns.

She suggested we block the stairs to the slide, WHAT DO YOU WANT? SLIDE.

Or, WHAT DO YOU WANT, UP? " and really try to get him to say UP, etc. I

could try, and tomorrow my therapist and I will go out and work on this

together trying to give one another moral support, but I am panicky

already. What if he decides no slide is worth it. What if he flops to the

ground and decides he could care less about a swing, and PUSH. I don't know

why I thought I would manage this ok, but I know it is important. What we

did besides wanting to encourage all language, all forms, is agree on

five-seven words he has said to several people fairly regularly, but nearly

always spontaneously. His echoic stuff is very weak, but she said it is

there a bit.

We will use the words, BALL, MOVIE/TV, RUN, HUG and the well said, CRACKER

and a couple others because he likes them, says an approximation or the

word, and they are not just food ones.

Can anyone give me some ideas of " programs " for this that are less formal

than DTT, but not free for alls, where believe me we'll hear these a couple

times and he'll be trying to get away so he can slide.

Jennie