When I went off on my first maternity leave, I assumed that I would be taking a year long vacation from my BCBA role and stepping into the new role of "Mom" until I returned to work. I packed away my textbooks, token boards, paperwork, and materials and anticipated that they would collect dust until the following year. However, I quickly learned that being a BCBA and a Mom do not occur in isolation. Once we emerged from the foggy newborn phase of sleepless nights and endless feeding, ABA started to creep back into my life. I look back on videos of my daughter when she was as young as 6 months old, and I can see that I was still using ABA with her...and it was working. ABA works for all sorts of individuals. It is a scientific method that uses the principles of behaviour and learning to create some form of meaningful change. Here are some of the ways that I incorporate ABA principles into my parenting of two spunky toddlers.
1. Reinforcement, reinforcement, reinforcement: Reinforcement is probably the most well known behavioural principle used in ABA. Basically, by rewarding a behaviour or skill with something that is motivating for that particular individual, they will remember that in the future and be more likely to demonstrate the skill or behaviour again in the future. The person does not need to be able to consciously understand that they are being rewarded, learning occurs naturally through the experience of accessing something desirable after an action. As a baby, my daughter absolutely loved adult praise and clapping. We used this to our advantage when teaching her new skills. Every time she even attempted to do something like roll, babble, walk, you can guarantee that I would be right there cheering, clapping, high fiving. To an outsider, it probably looked so over the top, but she loved it! She would be so excited for this reaction, that she would try again. I will never forget the moment that I took her on a visit to an extended family member's house and she began to play with her shape sorter. We were all chatting and not paying much attention to her. She completed the shape sorter and then stood up, walked over to us, and began to clap (while looking at us questioningly). We realized that she was actually reminding us to reward her for finishing the shape sorter. Once we all started clapping, she got the biggest smile on her face and proceeded to do that shape sorter about 10 more times!
2. Shaping: Shaping is a technique that helps teach a new skill by assisting and rewarding attempts of the skill, and gradually reducing the amount of help given. This is probably the technique that I used most (and still use) with my toddler. One example of how I used this, was when teaching my daughter to put on her pants. At first, I would have to help with all of the steps. Gradually, I was able to let her do a bit more independently. For example, I would help her get her leg in, but she was able to pop one foot through the foot hole. Later, I was able to guide her feet into each leg, but she was able to put both her feet through and pull the pants up. I also use this technique with teaching my younger daughter new words. As she is just starting to speak, her pronunciation is still getting there. When she first tries a new word (for example, water), we will praise any possible attempt of that word, even if it sounds nothing like the actual word (she started out by saying "wa"). After she gets comfortable with saying "wa", we will start trying to get her to say a closer version of the word ("wat") and praising her for saying the closer version instead. We keep doing this (wa becomes wat then wata then water) until she is saying the complete word of water. Shaping is such a powerful tool for teaching our toddlers, as they have so much to learn in the early years!
3. Potty Training: Where do I even begin with potty training, I could write a whole post on it! There are so many methods out there claiming to have your child potty trained in a day, but I stuck to what I knew. Having worked with many families on this particular goal, I used the same techniques that I had taught so many families. The way we potty train in ABA involves assessing readiness, ensuring there is a highly motivating reward for success, also rewarding staying dry,and scheduling frequent potty visits at the beginning. I also created a story for my daughter (called a social story) that gave her all of the specifics of what she would be expected to do, but is in a fun story format that had her as the main character (contact us if you would like us to create a social story just for your child as well). I'll be honest, potty training was not a fast or easy process like I expected it to be, but in the end, ABA principles are what got us there (with lots of troubleshooting along the way).
4. Visuals galore!: When presenting a program plan to a family, I usually included visuals as an additional supplement for teaching a new skill. Anyone who has ever worked with me, knows that I love visuals, especially for the younger kiddos! Extensive research indicates that when used in the right way, visuals can help an individual learn a skill faster or more thoroughly. Also, I don't know about your children, but mine will usually tune right out if I talk too much and present too many instructions. A visual gives them something concrete to look at that explains something about the particular task or activity. Some visuals that have been especially helpful in my house include visual schedules, token boards, and a timer. If you would like help creating visuals customized for your family and goals, contact us today to ask about our resource development consultation option.
5. First-Then: Any parent who has ever had a picky eater has probably tried using a "first-then" statement to get their child to eat something. "First eat your broccoli, then you can have your macaroni" because it works like a charm. Like many other parents, I also use first-then as a motivational tool at meal-time for my older daughter, who would survive off of bread, pasta, and rice if I let her. In our household though, first-then extends past meal-time. With a toddler who loves to test the limits, I find myself constantly using first-then statements throughout the day. Some of them sound like "first clean up your toys, then you can read your Frozen book", "first take a nap, then we will go to the park", "first you have to have a big sleep, then it will be Halloween in the morning", "first you have to share the doll with your sister, then you can have a turn by yourself". There will usually still be some grumbling, but it definitely gets the job done!
So as it turns out, you don't need to be in a clinical setting with therapists, formal program plans, specialized materials to use ABA. ABA is all around you in your parenting, even when you don't know it. If you would like more information on how you could use simple ABA strategies to help your child learn essential skills or reduce their behaviour, please reach out and schedule a consultation. My goal is to make ABA accessible to an average parent with no behavioural background.
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