Dr. Chris’ Autism Journal

One of the most difficult things facing families is what to do every year when summer comes!

Here are some useful sights to help you with the process:

1) This article gives practical advice for finding a summer program.

2) This article, written by a parent, is extremely helpful and talks about the importance of keeping up home programs over the summer.

3) This blog talks about ESY (Extended School Year) and your legal rights. In fact, this whole blog is about Law & Education and it written by an experienced lawyer - it is well done - I recommend checking it out!

4) Research often shows that children with autism are likely to lose skills when there is treatment is removed - typically developing children do not show as dramatic of a drop in their abilities with breaks in education. This finding has been shown in many studies in which a treatment is shown to be effective and generalizes to the natural environment - but at follow-up - skills are no longer present. Here is an example of a study with these kinds of findings (you may have to to order the original article if you are interested in reading the whole thing).

5) Many parent organizations (e.g. FEAT), clinics (e.g. New Horizons), and even summer camps (e.g. MySummerPrograms) are also available!

6) If you are not able to obtain services for summer or if you are getting limited services and think your child would benefit from more - TeachTown: Basics is an excellent gap-filler for your home or school program. In addition, Animated Speech Company offers software programs suitable for older children needing additional help with language.

Best of luck with your summer programs and stay tuned for tips for going back to school!

Over the Memorial Day weekend, Dr. Chris Whalen and Dr. Shannon Cernich attended the Applied Behavior Analysis International conference in Chicago.  There were many exciting presentations and new developments in the field of ABA related to autism.

Of particular interest was a poster presentation entitled “An Analysis of Instructor Errors in Discrete-Trial Teaching of Children with Autism” by Daniel Mruzek, Tristram Smith, and colleagues at the University of Rochester.  They found that the largest proportion of instructor errors when delivering discrete trial training (DTT) occurred when delivering reinforcement.

These errors were of two types:  The instructor reinforced an incorrect child response or the instructor failed to reinforce a correct child response.  For example, instructor says “Show me the big one.”   Child points at small item but instructor thinks the child pointed at big item and says, Great job!”  Or the child points at the big item but the instructor is looking at her data sheet and thinks the child did not respond and says, “Try again.”  As reinforcement (often colloquially known as reward) is what increases the rate of a response, DTT can result in the wrong responses being increased, even with a trained instructor.

This is not to suggest that DTT is a flawed methodology.  All training methods as well as life often result in the wrong responses being reinforced.  Imagine the following scenario:  You meet someone new named Shelly; you mishear her name and call her Sally.  She responds when you call her Sally and does not correct you.  Your behavior of calling her by the wrong name is reinforced.

So the point is not to end your child’s DTT program in place of some other methodology, but to make sure it is being properly supervised.  Trained, good ABA therapists will regularly make the errors describe above (they’re only human), but a good supervisor will detect and correct these errors while supervising your child’s session.

More highlights from the ABA conference will follow in future blogs, but in conclusion, Dr. Chris and Dr. Shannon gave presentations at the conference on the use of TeachTown: Basics, a computer-assisted program that delivers concepts during the computer sessions in a DTT format.  Although computerized instruction is meant to supplement human instruction, not replace it, we are proud to state that TeachTown: Basics delivers errorless reinforcement.  There are some things that computers can do better than people.  If only your computer would help you the next time your child tantrums!

The day started out a little foggy and crisp as crowds of volunteers made their way to the Dempsey Center located below the University of Washington’s main campus. Many of the walkers arrived at the center around 9am, as the sun began to slowly emerge from the clouds. Individuals were greeted with fresh bagels and bottled water prior to entering the Dempsey Center. Once inside, the walkers and teams registered, received their T-shirts and were free to peruse the resources and enjoy the entertainment. A stage located at the center of the field featured a rock band, a high school cheer and dance squad, and several speakers with their own inspirational words and anecdotes. The indoor track and field at the Dempsey Center was lined with booths from different organizations and companies devoted to autism research, programs, and interventions. Parents traveled up and down the track collecting countless literature, brochures, and even some samples from the different organizations supporting the cause. Not only was the morning insightful and fun for the parents, the kids had a great time as well getting their face painted, sliding down the gigantic blow up slide, bouncing inside the bounce house, blowing bubbles, and enjoying the ARC’s sensory station.

After the opening ceremony, walkers filed out of the center in clusters, while others chose to linger behind and take full advantage of the resources available. A caravan of families, parents with strollers, and individuals besieged the bike riders on the Burke Gilman Trail as they traveled from Dempsey Center to the main campus. The campus proved to be a gorgeous choice for the walk. The participants walked under a canopy of fiery fall leaves and were met halfway through the walk by a mariachi band. In addition to the park-like setting, the walk route was littered with signs filled with information regarding autism and how prevalent it has become within the last few years. With the growing numbers of children diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder, the importance to make people aware continues to increase, which is why supporting events such as the Annual Autism Speaks walk is crucial!

Pictures of the event can be found on the Alison Jensen Photography website: Alison Jensen Photography

For more information about the walk, check out the Autism Speaks website: Autism Speaks