ABC Data
Antecedent Behavior Consequence data (i.e. ABC Data) is an assessment tool that involves directly observing and recording factors surrounding a target behavior for the purpose of analyzing patterns and hypothesizing a possible function(s) maintaining the behavior.
Behavior Momentum
Behavioral Momentum essentially means to build up momentum to what you really want the child to do, by giving them easy tasks or demands, that they are highly likely to do first before presenting them with more difficult tasks. Instead of approaching the child with what you want them to do, you start with what they are most likely to want to do.
Chaining
Chaining is a behavioral strategy used to teach students with autism complex behaviors by breaking them down into smaller sequential steps. One of two methods, forward chaining and backward chaining, is selected based on the nature of the task or the skill levels of the child.
Choice Making
Choice making is an effective intervention for increasing the active participation of individuals with autism by allowing the indivdual to make a choice between at least 2 items/activities/reinforcers, etc.
Conversation Starters
Conversation starters are useful strategies for addressing initial conversations between children with autism and their peers
Fading
Fading is the procedure of transferring stimuli as prompts to the natural stimulus. The goal is for students to produce correct responses and minimize errors when only the natural stimulus is provided.
Priming
Priming is an intervention that helps prepare children for an upcoming activity or event with which they normally have difficulty. Priming can occur at home or in the classroom and is most effective if it is built into the child’s routine
Prompting
Prompting is used to increase desired behaviors and skill acquisition. When delivering prompts, the instructor should be mindful of the student’s learning level and fading considerations. Reinforcement should occur after a correct response and should be contingent upon the level of performance independence desired.
Reinforcement
The purpose of using reinforcement is to increase the frequency of a desired behavior occurring again under similar situations. As such, a reinforcer is the consequence of a behavior, leading to future occurrence. Positive reinforcement means the presentation of a consequence increases a behavior whereas negative reinforcement removes a negative stimulus to increase the occurrence of a behavior.
Replacement Behaviors
The goal of teaching replacement behaviors is to increase a more appropriate behavior to meet the same function as the target behavior, and to decrease or eliminate a target behavior that is not appropriate for the context.
Rules and Routines
Rules and routines can prevent problem behavior by providing information about what to do in a certain environment. Students can benefit from rules and routines as structure alleviates their confusion across settings and activities throughout the day.
Shaping
Shaping is a systematic process of reinforcing successive approximations to a target behavior. The technique is used when students need to learn new behavior. A teacher identifies the student’s behavior and provides reinforcement only for closer approximations toward the desired behavior, which is a terminal behavior of the shaping process. Shaping is especially useful when the desired behavior is difficult to learn by instruction, imitation, and verbal or physical cues.
Social Stories
Social narratives or stories can be used in various ways. Educators, paraeducators, parents, or other professionals can write social narratives for various situations. Based on the child’s needs and functioning levels in an academic or nonacademic setting, social narratives can guide the student toward appropriate behaviors or responses.
Visual Schedules
Visual schedules are an environmental support that accommodates the need for predictability and decreases anxiety about the unknown. Visual schedules take an abstract concept (i.e., time) and present it in a more concrete and manageable form using words and/or pictures.
Work System
The goal of a structured work system is to promote independence by providing the individual information on what to do in a designated work area. In structured work systems tasks and activities are organized in a way that are understandable to students with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD)