ABA
Infant-Toddler (IT) Centers
Infant-Toddler Development Programs offered
by ABC are center-based and designed to serve children
aged birth to three years who exhibit autistic-like
behaviors, who are at-risk for a diagnosis of Autism
or who have a diagnosis on the Autism Spectrum.
Early Intervention is Critical
Core Components of ABC’s
IT Program:
- Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA) is the
philosophy by which the program is informed and used
to analyze what is taught and how to teach it.
- Every child’s
program is individualized to his/her needs, learning
style and guided by what is developmentally expected.
- Teaching
occurs in naturalistic environments.
- Communication, pre-language
skills and reciprocity are taught within a social context
and interactive play situations.
- “Staying and Playing” by
Hart and Risley is emphasized. The child is an
active participant of his/her own learning. Social
factors that influence learning are incorporated.
- Imitation
is the cornerstone for which all skills are built upon.
Program Philosophy
Because Autism is a disruption of normal
development, and because research has repeatedly shown
that children diagnosed with Autism can, through systematic
intervention, meet and exceed developmental milestones
and become more typical learners, the age at which intervention
begins for a child with Autism or Autism Spectrum Disorder
is critical.
ABC’s Infant-Toddler (IT) program
focuses on facilitating
emerging skills such as initiation, eye contact,
imitation, play, and responding to social reinforcement
which appears not to be completely absent with children
under three years of age who are diagnosed or “at
risk” for being diagnosed with an Autism Spectrum
Disorder (ASD).
While children with Autism/ASD in
this age group (0-3 years) do not possess the complexity
of these repertoires as would be expected of children
over three, we have found that many of these children
are still able to learn by way of imitation and play
using social or natural reinforcement in conjunction
with ABA interventions tailored around these more typical
learning situations. Generally,
this type of learning environment is not highly effective
for children diagnosed as Autistic.
Program Summary
All assessments, lesson development and continued programming
are created within the theoretical framework of Applied
Behavior Analysis (ABA). Additionally, the
ABA teaching methods used are guided by what is developmentally
expected (e.g., Carolina Curriculum) in regards to
what behaviors are taught while maximizing learning in
the natural environment to enhance the teaching of pivotal
play repertoires and functional communication. Concurrently,
discrimination skills that prevent the child from acquiring
or generalizing what was taught in the natural learning
situation(s) are targeted and acquisitioned in a more
structured teaching situation using discrete trials,
chaining procedures, incidental learning, and a variety
of teaching techniques supported by the ABA research
(JABA, JEAB, Analysis of Verbal Behavior).
Moreover, learning is set up to represent
what is more age typical, therefore providing more
opportunities to respond to those stimuli commonly
found in the real world of an infant-toddler. Thus,
increasing the child’s generalization
ability and capturing as many social interactions as
possible such as initiating, greeting, looking at others
when name is called or spoken to and reciprocating attempts
to play or verbally interact. To enhance the generalization
aspect of our program, ABC also integrates a parent participation
component which is crucial to the success of the child.
This parent participation training program is based on
the book Steps to Independence by Drs. Bruce
Baker and Alan Brightman. During this 8-week course the
parents are introduced to basic behavior principles,
how to teach skills to their child, as well as behavior
intervention/reducing behavior excesses. Additionally,
parents learn the importance of consistency, reinforcement,
and making the reinforcement contingent on the child
completing the desired behavior. This course is important
to the program because it allows the parent to be an
active participant in their child’s program, as
well as teaching them techniques that they can utilize
in their home in order to increase independence, generalize
skills, and maintain skills.
Benefits and Outcomes
The importance of very early
ABA intervention
cannot be stressed enough as many parents
report the loss of these critical skills is virtually
complete by the age of three to four. All research
points to the fact that the earlier the intervention
is, the more success there is to be gained (Drash,
Koegel, Sundberg, Maurice, Green & Luce, etc).
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