ABA in school follow-up

[Guest guest]

We live in Union County up here in Blairsville. Initially, I

requested that the spec ed director invite an Autism specialist to

our IEP. This is a requirement according to the IEP rules. The

school must have an expert on the diagnosed disability at any IEP.

I suggested the BCBA who was running our home-based program at the

time. My child was almost three and we were starting our transition

meetings.

Pugh, with the North Georgia Autism Center trained me in ABA

(through her parent training program) and I hired a college student

(and I trained her) in ABA protocol. At our first IEP meeting I had

a video of my son when we first started ABA and then after a month I

had a second video along with a list of the mastered tasks we had

been working on. This proved the " EFFECTIVENESS " of ABA. I then

requested that my son have a full time para pro who would conduct

discrete trials several times throughout the day. Don't get me

wrong, I have had to remain diligent and supervise a lot of the

programs from home. But, eventually we worked out a plan and our

BCBA actually wrote our IEP goals and incorporated Natural

Environment Programs along with the DTT. So, basically my son gets

ABA from 8:00 a.m - 2:30 p.m. Mon through Thursday. We were able

to get ESY services and the teacher who is working with my son this

summer, has been training in ABA with Ms. Pugh at the North Georgia

Autism Center over the past couple of weeks.

It has not been an easy task, but if you go to these IEP meetings,

knowing what is appropriate and effective for your child and you

back up your suggestions with evidence (i.e. video tapes) it is hard

for the school district to refute the " appropriateness and

effectiveness " of ABA as a teaching protocol for our autistic

children. The surgeon general in 2001 stated, " ABA is the most

scientific and effective teaching method for autistic children " .

Let's see them refute that!!!