ABA - motivators for extinguish plan

Post Reply New Topic

My son (10, Asperger's and lots of sensory issues) just had an ABA (Applied Behavior Analysis) testing/observation completed at school.

We have a meeting in June to go over all of the reports and data collected. However, they would like to incorporate a behavior extinguish plan before the end of the year.

To make this more "meaningful" for my son, they came up with a motivator to help the plan. The motivator is Recess. He likes being outdoors -- whether he plays with anyone or not, he just wants to be OUTDOORS.

Behaviors to Extinguish

o no touching (he has been working on this since Dec and has done well)
o no loud or rude noises/gestures
o no disrespectful words or talking out loud without raising hand

1. He will be given a LIST of things NOT to do, and WHAT to do instead.
2. If he does something on the list, he will have 1 minute taken away from his recess.
3. If he argues and does not comply, he will be given a warning first before an additional minute is taken.
4. He will be removed from classroom if he continues to argue.

Has anyone had their child go through an extinguish plan?? I know that the "No Touching" behavior took months for us to complete.

Do you think this is too much to work on at once??
My personal opinion is that he has so many sensory issues that he NEEDS to run around at recess to get that extra anxiety OUT of his body.

It sounds a bit like training a dog, to me. If I was your son's age, I'd rebel and act up.

In some ways I agree about "training like a dog." But he must learn appropriate/acceptable behavior. This needs to be clear, concise training so he will remember. It's a matter of routine to change a behavior.

Knowing appropriate behavior come naturally to others. Asperger's kids need to be taught/trained to change their behavior pattern.

So he may rebel at first, but once it becomes an acceptable routine, he hopefully will comply.

I just don't like the recess as the motivator. I wanted to hear feedback about what OTHER motivators have been used.

I can't give you suggestions for motivators that have been used, since my son hasn't had ABA, but the motivators should be POSITIVE motivators, not punitive! Taking away recess should NOT be used - if it is, there will be terrible consequences, in terms of his ability to function for the rest of the day. Also, his anger at what has "been done to him" will make it almost impossible for him to abide by the plan for extinction of the "undesirable" behaviors.

What does the pre-data show in terms of frequency of these behaviors? What are the goals? It's not reasonable to expect him to go from wherever he is now to zero as soon as you or they decide it's time to start working on it. That's not ABA. If he's doing whatever behavior 10x per day, they need to have a reasonable first goal. Maybe that's 7x per day. Maybe the date is being done based on intervals - that he doesn't do it for at least half an hour. Maybe he's doing it every twenty minutes at this point. So if he goes for more than twenty minutes, or for half an hour, he gets a point or a token or something. When he earns a certain number of tokens, he gets to be on the computer (or do something else HE likes doing) for five minutes or whatever time period has been worked out).

Make sure they are really using ABA and not just some pretend version that is guaranteed to elicit oppositional behavior, which the plan you described is likely to do. The person establishing the plan has to be trained and certified in ABA, not someone who took a two hour seminar. Starting to work on something shouldn't mean that the child immediately starts getting punishments - that means there's no way to win. Even if he cuts his behaviors in half the first day (not a reasonable expectation), he'd be getting punished when he should be getting massive praise and rewards for doing a spectacular job. This is an AWFUL plan.

I absolutly agree with jat! Your child needs postive motivators not negative. And how can you call taking recess away a motivator??? LOL. He NEEDS the recess more than they will know.

Do NOT take away recess! I agree with CockneyRebel - it's setting him up to rebel against getting punished. He will never learn WHY he shouldn't be in other people's space.

For my son, the teachers keep several cards that says something like "I know how to raise my hand first". See - a nice positive statement about the goal you would eventually like to have occur. Then, if he DOES do that, that card comes right out, and he gets a sticker, or whatever reward. Perhaps if the stickers add up to 4 in a row (that's something to decide - what is the appropriate goal for your guy) then he'll get EXTRA recess. That would motivate me! Will it work perfectly, no, but over time, I think this will help more than talking away much needed gross motor activity. Maybe if he does talk out of turn, touch someone, etc.. someone could show him the "prize" card and say - "oh darn, I was hoping to be able to give you a sticker to help you reach your goal... maybe next time." That would make him self-motivated (hopefully) to do better next time.

After that, how about a social story. "When I raise my hand first, everyone will look and listen to me. The teacher will call on me to answer, and even if she doesn't, she knows I have an answer. If I just speak out of turn, all of the other kids and teacher get mad, because that's not the fair way to decide who talks in class." [I'm no expert, so pardon if this is not the 'perfect' story, but you get my drift...]

I would NOT want to be punished for having AS behaviors. I would also not use food as a reward - that's too much like a dog, too. P.S. O would get a second opinion from someone outside the school about ideas to help you're son. They appear clueless to me. That numbered list of what to do looks more like "how to escalate my kid and get him even more upset"

I agree with jat about the motivators -- they are supposed to be positive.

Part of what makes this ABA stuff tricky is that your son is 10 -- it can work, but he's kind of on the upper age limit (in my opinion -- and I'm no expert). Motivators are supposed to be given for GOOD behavior, not something that is taken away for BAD behavior.

At close to this age, with my son we used something called POWER CARDS [Here's a link to Amazon.com so that you can take a look at the book -- http://www.amazon.com/Power-Cards-Inter ... 1931282013]. It was something a teacher could use to hold up during class, to quietly tell a child to stop certain behaviors. The cards were made specifically with a hero on the card that the child is interested in [for example, if your son likes X-men, then the card will use that hero] and then the card will say something on it like "Wolverine says to not yell out loud -- please raise your hand!". This is a nice way of doing things, because it's subtle -- not all of his class members will notice what the teacher is doing, but your SON will because he's attracted to the cards because of the hero.

We used this for a year, and it worked REALLY well. The teachers had never heard of this technique before, and were surprised that it worked. We did NOT use this in conjunction with ABA motivators, but I suppose you could.

Basically, you just keep trying various techniques to see what your son responds to. It doesn't matter what it is -- ABA, Power Cards, etc. -- if it works, you use it, and don't let anyone else discourage you if you find something useful for your son.

I totally understand why no touching is a part of the plan, but the other two,

no loud or rude noises/gestures
no disrespectful words or talking out loud without raising hand

Seem a little out of scale here. Just how bad does he get with these things? Our kids NEED to move and they NEED to express, they just need guidance on channeling that and picking the better ways.

Basically, I'm not comfortable with the plan. Is it really necessary?

I am a bit late on this, but I wanted to let you know that the person doing "ABA" sounds like they have no clue what they are doing. First of all that is in no way an extinction processes. Extinction is if someone no longer reinforces a behavior. So if you are swearing just to get a reaction out of me, so I stop giving you a reaction and you stop doing it. That is extinction. Also in terms of target behavior, you always talk in terms of positive, what we are teaching, instead of no touching, you would want to reinforce (for example) nice touching (i.e. handshakes). You can quash tons of behavior if talk in terms of reduction, but then once you reduce all behaviors to nothing, what are you left with. Also, you never want to start with a punishment procedure, which is what that is. Punishment should only be used if everything positive has been tried and the behavior is not reducing and the behavior is dangerous to the person or others. Hope that helps!

Personal opinion: this plan serves the teacher and the other students in the classroom. It does little if anything for the affected child. Learning appropriate behaviors was not a Pavlovian process for me; the more I was forced, the more I pushed back. Without cognitive understanding, no amount of force or external pressure made something 'right'. My energy was more mental than physical; I read several books during classes while jotting notes when I found something interesting. When that was taken away, my challenges increased several times over.


M.

I don't know anything about ABA or extinguishing plans so can't comment on those aspects of this.

However, my son's school have been working with him on some of his behaviours and have used a reward system as a motivator. Instead of having anything taken away from him, he gets points for achieving his aims and at the end of the week the points are converted into computer time. They haven't set the bar too high as they know he would be discouraged if he didn't get these points. A realistic plan has been worked out which is achievable with a little bit of extra effort or thought on my son's part.

I don't think recess time should be taken away - quite the opposite. My son's school have given him various tasks and duties which get him moving around in a meaningful and useful way. He gets to wipe the board when the teacher is finished, go to other classrooms or the office with any messages, is a recycling monitor and helps the playground buddies carry play equipment out the playground at playtimes. The school recognise that he needs to move and have breaks out of class and away from his seat. He also needs to work on his co-ordination and upper body strength. All these things are being achieved in a way that doesn't set him apart as being different, and give him increased confidence in himself.

You'll find that a lot of people with ASDs have negative opinions of ABA, because we've suffered through it ourselves. Training a dog is a fairly apt analogy.

It really only teaches someone to mimic a behavior or response based on the premise of receiving a reward or the fear of not receiving one. In some cases (such as extinguishing self harm behaviors) the benefits are very obvious, but they're less beneficial for social rules and behaviors.

You can make a child shake someone's hand, greet another person, or make eye contact in a very superficial way, but ABA does nothing to change the underlying lack of social cognition. I had no idea what the purpose of looking someone in the eye was until it was explained to me, and the ABA therapy I received regarding making eye contact didn't really improve my ability to do it in an appropriate manner.

At any rate, negative reinforcement not something that should be done; I'm relatively certain that ABA practitioners are not meant to use these any longer.

Something you need to do right now is tell the school that you do not like this plan and that you want a plan put into place that basis itself on Positive Behavior Supports. You have the right to this under IDEA, as I am sure your son has an IEP, he would need one for the plan you described to be put into place.

As well you should never agree to this sort of plan because it is focusing on issues not related to the primary issue. As well the punishments, and they are punishments, are not congruent with him learning anything.

Plus they leave open the possibility of your child getting abused by the school district. Your son will learn nothing with this and instead will learn that he should fear someone who has authority over him.

Plus you cannot teach someone, even someone with Asperger's, by reinforcement and repetition. The person needs explanation for why the activity has to be done otherwise what is the point of doing it. Your son will never learn properly why he shouldn't touch people if only the no touching rule is enforced and he is never explained why it is inappropriate to not touch people, and this involves sitting down and talking with him, and being shown when its appropriate to touch and in what ways people can and cannot be touched.

A good example would be a food making one. You can give a person all they need to cook a meal and then you can set a completed meal in front of them. With ABA they expect the person to react to the cooked meal and cook a meal based on how the cooked meal looks. However the person fails and fails and fails because they have no idea how to cook the meal. However if a person sits down with them and teaches them how to cook the meal then they actually learn how to cook instead of react to cooking. Not to mention every time you don't cook right with ABA you get punished.

Plus taking away something that your son enjoys is cruel and inhumane. There are better ways to do things and ABA is not one of those ways.