Over the past 10 years, children with autism and their families have taught me many things, and they continue to do so. You may get sick of the phrase, “If you’ve met one person with autism, you’ve met one person with autism,” but when it comes to autism treatment, in particular, ABA therapy, unique and individualized approaches must be implemented for maximum results.

Is ABA not working?

A good therapist knows when and how to flow with your child. Therapy treatment for autism is unique in that you may start with one strategy and end on another, and maybe go back to the one you tried before. Why all the zig zags? The answer is simple, the child is always right. If they are still making errors or struggling with challenging behavior we are missing something. It’s our jobs to be detectives. Graphs can help with this too, but sometimes there is more to be discovered.

Progress is a Process

Not having the answers right away is discouraging at times, wondering why it isn’t working, but once it clicks it makes it worth it and we, the parents, caregivers, therapists, teachers etc., get to celebrate all the success with the child! Because of a particular incident with one of my past clients, I’ve renamed this “aha moment” to Dinocircus. Here’s why…

The “Aha Moment”

My registered behavior technician (RBT) and I were working on identifying letter sounds with our client. We showed them an image of a single letter and asked, “What’s the letter sound?” they had trouble with this skill and after the letter A would excitedly add,  “A is for Dinocirus!” To which we would offer them an alternative word that actually did start with the letter A.

They insisted that we were wrong and repeated themselves, “A is for Dinocircus! Yes!” At first I thought they were being silly, they would sometimes present the incorrect answers when they knew the right ones and laugh, so it wouldn’t be out of character. However, as they continued to do this into the next session and became more persistent, I thought maybe we just needed to try moving onto the next task without correcting them to test and see if that helped with the meltdowns that it was now turning into. This strategy did help, but they continued to say it. By the third session it clicked. Not that they were doing it wrong, but that we didn’t know what we didn’t know. That was the day I learned that a Deinosuchus was a 10-meter-long ancient alligator. Lo and behold “A is for Alligator!”

The child is always right

“The child is always right” typically refers to how the child is responding to the environment and if they aren’t successful something in the environment needs to change. Understanding the environment so we can change it in order for the client to experience more success is a key component of ABA therapy. In this case, it was more of a reminder that we don’t always have all the answers even when they are right in front of us. In the story above, the child didn’t have the words to teach us and we didn’t have the knowledge yet to bridge the gap for them. “A” really was for Deinosuchus!