Other Teaching Programs

The following are other teaching approaches that may be helpful for your child. However, these teaching programs are not based on the science of ABA.

Floor Time

What is Floor Time?

Floor Time is a way of engaging, relating, communicating, and building a partnership with the child. The philosophy of this approach believes that the basic unit of intelligence is the connection between feelings (desires) and symbols (actions). Therefore, for a child to understanding their environment, he or she must have an emotional/affective relationship with their environment.

The Floor Time approach (work by Stanley Greenspan) aims at building and mastering social, emotional, cognitive and motor development to the fullest capacity. Parents/therapists work on:

• Eliciting affect to engage, attend and learn
  
• Open and close circles of communication
  • gestural communication and language
  • symbolic and representational play and logical conversations
• Encourage motor planning sequences
• Climbing the symbolic ladder
• Expand the child’s emotional range and flexibility

Who would benefit from Floor Time?

• a child who experiences difficulty regulating
• a child who has difficulty with relating and communicating (Multisystem Developmental Disorder)
• a child with Autism Spectrum Disorder
• a child who is fearful of or not expressing their emotions

PECS®
Picture Exchange Communication System

What is PECS?

The Picture Exchange Communication System (PECS®) is an augmentative communication system that helps a child acquire functional communication skills through picture exchanges. In doing this, the child initiates a communicative act within a social context. The following are some of the communicational skills taught:

Request preferred items and activities
Answer Yes/No to “Do you want ….?”
Request assistance, ‘break’, and items to complete a task
Respond to wait and greetings
Learn and use descriptive concepts (big/little, colors)
Comment on the child’s environment

PECS begins with teaching the child to exchange a picture of a desired item with a therapist/parent, who immediately honors the request. For example, the child hands a picture of juice to the mother and the mother hands a cup of juice to the child. The system goes on to teach the discrimination of the pictures and then puts them all together to create simple sentences such as “I want chips.” Research shows that many kids using this form of communication develop speech!!!!!

Who would benefit from PECS?

• a child with difficulty communicating
• a child who has been exposed to visuals/pictures and who has problems discriminating
• a child who uses pictures as a Functional Communication system and are ready to expand their skills
• a child with Autism Spectrum Disorder or a communication difficulty (i.e., verbal dyspraxia)

RDI®
Relationship Development Intervention®

What is RDI?

The Relationship Development Intervention (RDI) is a developmental program designed to teach the motivation and skills for Relative Processing which is the ability to process and monitor the importance in the meaning and value of information that changes depending on the person, place and time. For example, relative thinking involves the understanding that some situations/problems do not have a single right or wrong solution. It also deals with the ability to think ‘outside of the box’ and ‘in shades of gray’.

RDI extends the current social skills training by focusing on the essential skills of friendship and relationship development. There are ten progressive skill areas that make finding and maintaining friendships
successful for children and adolescents. Some goals addressed include:

social enjoyment
referencing
reciprocity
acceptance
social variation and adaptation
repairing and regulating behavior
alliance and acceptance

Who would benefit from RDI?

• a child with relationship challenge
• a child with Autistic Spectrum Disorder
• a child with NVLD/ or Learning Disability
• This program is useful for teaching relationship development from age two through young adulthood

TEACCH
Treatment and Education of Autistic and other related
Communication handicapped Children

What is TEACCH?

TEACCH is a structured, errorless learning approach used for children and adolescents that can be implemented in a variety of environments including home, school, clinic, and community. The overall goal of the TEACCH approach is to help develop skills and increase independence. Other goals include: (1) increase receptive and expressive communication, (2) visually support learning, (3) help child stay calm due to increased understanding of the world around him/her by using visual supports, and (4) reduce behaviors caused by anxiety and confusion.

In order to reach these goals, the TEACCH approach uses:

1. A structured teaching approach to maximize learning (from looking at task the child knows how to do task as well as knowing when task is completed)
   
2. Child-specific created ‘work systems’ during 1:1 teaching as well as independent work
3. Visual schedules to increase a child’s independence of routine and flexibility
   
4. Visual supports for leisure/play activities
   

Who would benefit from TEACCH?

• a child who learns well through the use of visuals (i.e., pictures)
  
• a child who experiences difficulty with independent skills (i.e., play skills, self-help skills)
  
• a child who has difficulty with transitions and/or new activities
  
• a child with behavioral problems