Prompting...

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Hi - Parent of an AS son here... I have a subject I'd love some insight on if anyone cares to respond: Long story short is that my son requires promping to complete even those tasks that are very familiar and routine. A good example is the beginning of his school day: He's supposed to hang up his coat and backpack then enter the classroom and go to his seat. I'm sure he knows what to do but he stands around waiting for someone to tell him it's ok to do it. We encounter this at home in various little ways, and it's become second nature for me to jump in with the required prompt, but I can't do that forever. It obviously affects how he functions at school, too, so it's something we need to find ways to deal with. We are currently trying to switch from verbal prompts to a visual schedule in order to help him become more independent, but the catch is that he sometimes still waits for prompts even though he understands the schedule... Can anyone help me understand what his thought process might be? He's only almost 6, and nowhere near being able to help me out with this... Is it as simple as just needing reassurance or does it go beyond that? I don't want to sound completely ignorant, but I'm an NT and I sincerely want to understand what's going on so that I can respond to him in the way he needs me to... I also need to be able to advocate for him when other people get upset or impatient with him.

I think its one of two things.

Either the child forgets what to do because its not important enough (to him) to remember.

Or more likely the prompting has become part of the routine.

Its not simply "do A then B then C" in his mind the proper procedure is "wait to be prompted, do A, wait to be prompted, do B, wait to be prompted, do C".

He may feel insecure. Engage him in confidence-building activities. Put him into situations that require him to duel with you intellectually, such as playing some board game with him on weekends.

This sounds like "exposure anxiety" which Donna Williams explained.

But I might be very wrong; I never read her book.

I would agree that it could be either of these but also think it possible it could be -

He may think it naughty to do without being told each time.
He may think he HAS to wait to be told to do each part, as previously he would have had to be told to do things rather than choose himself. If you have the idea from the past, that you MUST or MUST NOT do things, and you take things literally (like auties / Aspies), then at that age it is hard to know you can do things without being told each time.

This is one of the things I had difficulty with as a child, and even to some degree as an adult when working in an office.