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Before I start working in an ABA center I was super intimidated by the world of Applied Behavior Analysis. Technically speaking, my classroom worked on the “principles“ of ABA but I did not get any type of training in ABA until my fourth year teaching, and even when the training started it was minimal at best. I clearly remember being in an IEP meeting my second year of teaching. There was an advocate involved and we had supervisors there as well. The meeting was tense and I felt overwhelmed. I was still very young and very inexperienced and super nervous. The advocate asked about ABA the supervisor said oh Nicole does use principles of ABA in her classroom. Nicole, can you share what those are?
I froze. I have no idea what she was talking about. I had heard the term ABA but it wasn’t even sure what it stood for let alone knew what the principles were. I still don’t know how I fumbled through that meeting but I remember feeling like she asked me to speak a foreign language that I didn’t know. I didn’t realize that I actually was doing principles of ABA in the classroom I just didn’t know what they were. And I think that’s the case a lot of the time, both with principles of ABA and with evidence-based procedures in general. There are so many things that quality teachers do all day every day and we don’t realize that there’s a lot of research backing the decisions that they’re making. That’s what this blog post is for. I’m going to share five simple ABA techniques that you can use in your classroom. You’re probably already using some of them and if you’re not I will share some techniques that can help a lot. And you will have things in your mental catalog that you can pull out when you need it and if asked about ABA principles, you can confidently say oh yes, let me share!
Token Economy Systems
The first strategy I recommend is a token economy. This is a very easy system is set up and it’s a great way to reinforce our students. When you think about it, we’re all reinforce to go to work. Would you go to work if you didn’t get your paycheck? Probably not. So the concept of giving our students tokens for work is the same exact concept. They deserve to be reinforced for working the same way we are. Your token economy can look however you want. You can have them earn two tokens, five tokens, 10 tokens. You can do a money system where they can save up their tokens to buy things or you can have more of a flat system where every time they earn five tokens they get a break.
You can have them choose a picture of what they’re working for before they start working so they stay motivated in a whole work session. Try customizing the token board to their interest. If they love paw patrol, have all of their tokens be pictures of paw patrol characters. If is an older student try a more mature deisgn like maybe they’re just earning a black square. You could even use real coins if you’re trying to teach money concepts or use buttons or any other knickknack around your house.
Most of the token boards I make are a rectangle. The top half of the rectangle size I am working for on the left and there’s a square on the right and that is where we put the picture of what the child is working for. Below that there will be five boxes and that’s where the tokens will go. Once they get all 5 tokens they earn whatever is in the box with a picture. And again your tokens to be for anything. You can give a token for every five minutes on task, you can give a token for every five problems completed, you can give a token for every response you get, you can get a token for really anything that you design. The key is just to have a very clear system laid out so that way all staff members know what is going on and they’re implementing it the same way. What do you have all staff doing at the same thing, the expectation becomes clear for your student and they can be more successful!
Visual Schedules
A visual schedule is another great ABA strategy that’s often used in classrooms. A lot of times students with autism spectrum disorders really depend on very clear and consistent routines. They like to do the same things at the same times every day. A schedule can really go along way in helping them know what you expect and let’s them know what’s coming. But what if the student is unable to read? Your written schedule might not help them. Try having a visual schedule with pictures instead. So if I know that we are going to do some work at the table and then we’re going to go to the bathroom then we’re going to go eat lunch and we’re going to end up playing in the gym then I will have a picture of the table room, the bathroom, the lunch room, and the gym and then my student will have a much clearer understanding of what we’re going to be doing that day.
You might have to play around and figure out what works best for your student. They might do fine with clipart images or they might benefit from real photos. You can try pairing an image with text if they’re working on reading a schedule and then you can eventually fade out the pictures. It’s super easy to customize and change so it grows with the student and just like we like agendas whn we head into a meeting so we know what to expect, a visual schedule can help your student know exactly what to happenin the classroom so they’re not caught off guard by anything.
Natural Teaching Environment
The natural teaching environment was something that I truly did not understand when I start working at my center just because it seems so simple to me. I was really used to having a hands-on material that was spefically designed to work on an IEP goal that the idea of just walking into a room and using whatever you found was baffling to me but it’s actually such a natural and fun way to work on skills.
For example, I have a client who’s working on a lot of imitation both physical imitations like fine motor skills and vocal imitation. He’s also working on play skills and he’s working on vocabulary so we can go to the playroom and we can pull down the barn and all the farm animals. We can work on vocal imitation and identifying all of the animals. We can use fine motor skills to manipulate the items. We can work on his endurance with play skills And if he’s struggling with a toy and needs help we can work on him requesting assistance and not getting frustrated.
I had no idea how powerful it could be to use toys and the best thing about it is it was easy to show the parents as well. They might not have the same flashcards we have but if they have toys at home and we can quickly model how we’re working on skills using the toys that they can do the same thing. It’s also way more natural as students get older. In the classroom, you could do a similar concept. I would not interrupt their recess as a teacher but maybe in my schedule when I had a free pocket I would have 10 minutes of playtime. I might put a couple of different toys on the table and have students interact and then I could work on a bunch of skills related to communication as we played with the toys. It’s fun for them, it’s more likely to be meaningful and you are able to get a ton of data. You can take the same concept when you’re reading a book or maybe going on a walk outside. Get creative and look for pockets of time where you can work on goals without having to be sitting at a table with a deck of flashcards.
Rules of Reinforcement
The next suggestion is the rules of reinforcement! This is not necessarily something you do with the student but it’s the perfect way to run your classroom. There are some rules of reinforcement that make it be way more effective and they are probably things you already do. Number one is the reinforcement should be reinforcing. I know that sounds really obvious but let me give you an example. Most kids love technology and enjoy iPad time or music. I had a student one year that hated the iPad. It was not an effective reinforcer for him at all. We tried a couple times to get him to work for an iPad thinking that if we found the right video or game he would be into it but it never hooked him.
Once I took the time to do a preference assessment and discovered that he really liked things like Legos and blocks and love to build I realized that that was a way more effective reinforcer. So whatever reinforcement you give, make sure the child actually likes it. It’s also important to rotate your reinforcers. You don’t want a child using the same thing because you have the risk of them becoming satiated. What that means is they get too much of it. Think about it like this. You might love wine but if you have a little too much wine on a Friday night you probably don’t wanna wake up Saturday morning and have another glass. This is the same concept because you truly can have too much of a good thing. The most effective way to combat this is to rotate the reinforcers. You can figure out a rotation that works best for you. Maybe you rotate the reinforcers every day, or maybe it’s every week or maybe it’s once a month but keep switching it up for them so they have a variety to choose from and it will have all of your reinforcers last a lot longer.
You also need to give your reinforcers on a contingent basis. What that means is you should not be giving the reinforcer unless you’ve seen whatever it is you’re trying to reinforce. If you start giving reinforcers at any time then they’re not a reinforcer anymore because the child is no longer working for it. So make sure whatever it is you’ve set up whether it’s appropriate behavior correct responses or anything else make sure the reinforcement is given after you see that. Also, make sure you’re giving the reinforcers consistently. How do you get the child to know that they’re going to get their reinforcer when you’re starting out? You have to build that trust. If you tell them that they get a token for every five minutes they’re on task and when they get five tokens they get access to a reinforcer and then when those 25 minutes are up you don’t give them access then they don’t trust you anymore because you didn’t follow through and it’s not going to work.
Keep that in mind as you start to develop things like token boards. Even if your child loves going on a walk outside, if you’re in a classroom and you know that you might not be able to consistently give them a walk outside whenever they earn it then that might not be a good choice for the token board. Make sure anything that you’re offering as a reinforcer is something that you can actually provide when the reinforcer is earned. And eventually, you’ll want to fade the reinforcer. If you’re giving the child a token for every third response they make hopefully over time you’ll be able to increase it to every fourth response. If you’re giving a token for five minutes up on-task behavior hopefully you can increase it to seven minutes of on-task behavior. Work hard to get your system of reinforcement working and then as the child becomes successful work on increasing the demand and fading the reinforcer. It is totally OK if this takes time. You might use the same schedule of reinforcement for six months, and especially in teaching where you have to deal with things like winter break summer break snow days, and then this period of Covid going back-and-forth between in-person and distance learning you might be stuck for the entire year. Be gentle with yourself and just be as consistent as you can and do your very best.
Discrete Trial Training
My last recommendation is called discrete trial training and it’s often referred to as DTT. It’s a very simple concept, it’s just a very structured way of teaching a new skill. This is probably what most people picture ABA sessions to be. I’ll give a very simple example. Let’s say you’re introducing shapes to a student. You might place 4 cards in front of them one with a square one with a circle, one with a rectangle, and one with a triangle. You might tell the child to touch the triangle. When the child touches the triangle you immediately provide reinforcement. If the child does not respond at all or they touch the wrong item you immediately correct them. You will take data on it and then the trial is over. You want to make sure you do multiple trials and keep your trials consistent. This will make it much easier for you to compare your data.
If you do four trials on Monday and 20 trials on the next day it’s gonna be hard to track. Set a number of trials and then do the same number of trials every time you work on it. You will want to use a very high powered reinforcer. And if you’re going to do edibles like candy try cutting it up. I might take a gummy bear and cut it into four or six different pieces so that way the child can have frequent reinforcement but I’m not giving them 20 gummy bears in a session. Another key to this is working in small increments. If you’re introducing colors try only introducing 4 colors, don’t be teaching 12 colors at one time. Once you master the first floor colors then you can move to the second set of four colors you picked out. It’s also important to set your mastery criteria before you start. So how many times does a child need to identify the items correctly before you went to the next trial? That’ll make it very easy for you to know when to move forward. The whole point of discrete trial teaching is repetition. While DTT might not be appropriate for every child this is a great choice for a child who might be struggling to acquire skills. It is a much more systematic approach to teaching basic skills like color shape number and letter ID as well as telling time fraction ID anything along those lines.
I hope this blog gave you some ideas of how to apply ABA in the classroom. If there is something you want to learn more about or want me to cover in a blog, don’t hesitate to reach out! My goal is to make ABA not so intimidating and super applicable for teachers-I’ve been in your shoes and I get it. I am here for you every step of the way!