ABA Programs

[Jamies Mommy]

Hi All,
Jamie has been in an ABA program Since the end of November. I'm wondering how long it is before on sees some progress? I really don't see him making any on the simplest of tasks. I'm also wondering if at 10 they are just too set in their ways for ABA to be very effective.
He has been so out of control at his school ( and its been increasing) that they have been frequently using a three person restraint on him and hes been coming home with bruises as a result. They always send a report when they have to use it and indicate where brusing might appear however I'm concerned because with Jamie usually restraint is the least effective and it makes him more angry and out of control.
Prior to ABA he has always been in a TEACCH program and made pretty good progress, hes hand his moments and meltdowns but they weren't near as bad as they are now.

[Pamster]

I wish I had the answers Jamies Mommy, but my ten year old has had previous ABA work and we did see progression in his ability to understand that language and cues could get him what he was wanting. We're using ABA again now (he's ten now, the prior ABA goes back to 2002 when he was more like 5-6) so I don't know if we're seeing real results again or not, because he too is acting out in school and we're having trouble getting him motivated to do his school work. I want the best for him as does any other parent but I don't know that ABA is the avenue to get what we're looking for.

Six months ago I'd have been raving about RDI, (relationship Development Intervention) but they've (the dr's behind it) have since changed the entire system and I don't agree with it any longer so I don't use their NEW OS (operating setup) and still do use a little of the old principles of RDI daily, and we did see a lot of progress with it when I was really actively working with it with my son. Although I don't know how much is just him growing and learning and how much is because his one behavior med was increased due to aggression and that's all but disappeared now thankfully. It's hard to really KNOW what's helped and what's not helping you know?

Maybe some of the others will have more to add. :) I have no experience with the TEACCH program so I can't offer any feedback on that, but we did ABA and RDI. :)

[peglem]

Geez, I hate meltdowns! Are they trying to use ABA to address this? I can't see how they'd do that...how do you reinforce a lack of behavior? Here's what we've been doing with Allie for about 6 months that is helping:

First of all, I finally realized that she doesn't want to melt down. So, I told her I'm sorry this is happening, but I want to help her be safe so she doesn't hurt herself when it happens. It took about 2 or three months before she got where she really indicated that she wanted help. Help consists of putting her in a hold. It used to take 2 or 3 people to hold her, but now, with her semi-cooperation, I can do it all by myself. I just keep reminding her that she needs to be safe. She still struggles against the hold, kind of reflexively, but I can tell she's trying hard to not let it overwhelm her. My goal is, with time (probably lots of it) that she can get to the point where she can "talk" herself through it and learn to keep herself safe. Another thing is, when the monster rage grabs hold of her and I'm restraining her, I'll find a way to get her to focus her attention on something: used to be a song with hand movements, but lately she prefers I count five on my fingers and then she has to give me five. This works well for us. But, mostly I think its just that she knows I'm helping her and not upset with the behavior. Hope that helps.

I found this website that gives alot of good, practical advice and suggestions to help deal with rages:

http://members.tripod.com/LeeLydon/rage.html


Wow, here's another good one:

http://www.schoolbehavior.com/conditions_rage.htm

[tgrimes]

...how do you reinforce a lack of behavior?


Reinforcement schedule... you reward for every ten minutes of the behavior not happening, then increase time increments as progress is made.
Sometimes you can start with a whole day, sometimes it needs to be as little a ten minutes, it depends on the baseline occurence before starting the reinforcement.

[peglem]

Reinforcement schedule... you reward for every ten minutes of the behavior not happening, then increase time increments as progress is made.
Sometimes you can start with a whole day, sometimes it needs to be as little a ten minutes, it depends on the baseline occurence before starting the reinforcement.


Oh, duh! That makes sense! I don't think this would work for Allie. The rage comes on like someone flipped a switch. I can't imagine her thinking "oh, I better not, I'll lose my star..."

[rbear4]

Also, they reinforce other more appropriate behavior. So for instance if a child hits it isn't that they reward "not hitting" but they reward the child keeping his hands to himself, etc.

They should also teach replacement behaviors. It is important to determine why behavior is occuring and then teach a replacement, more appropriate behavior. So for instance, if a child is hitting because he is frustrated with an activity you teach him to ask for a break and reinforce the request rather than waiting for the child to hit to get out of the activity.

Jaime's mommy, he really should be making some progress by now. Perhaps they need to make some changes to his program. He is definitely communicating that he is very frustrated. ABA can work if it is very individualized to what the child needs and how they learn but if it is used as a control type thing with little creativity and flexibility, then it may not work for him. You need someone who is creative and can do a great functional analysis.

Renee

[Italia]

Can someone of you explain me what ABA program is?:D