Mia, a sweet girl with an autism diagnosis, has been receiving visits from a behavior therapist. The ABA (Applied Behavior Analysis) “behavior therapist” comes to the house between 5 and 25 hours a week. She plays games and does activities to find out the best way to encourage Mia’s social development.
Mia’s mom has already started to see some improvement in her daughter’s social behavior. Encouraged by the progress, Mom asked what she could do in between visits to encourage her daughter’s developmental progress.
Discover Hope often hears this question from parents of children with autism who are receiving ABA therapy.
What can parents do in between behavior therapist visits to support their child?
- Tell your child how proud you are of his hard work. It may look like your child is having fun (because he is!), but working with a behavior therapist is work. Since the activities your child does with the behavior therapist are geared towards meeting your child’s personalized social and behavioral goals, the child will have to correct behavior and learn while they are playing.
- Follow through with the recommended strategies from the behavior therapist. Some of the strategies might be more work for you at first since they will be new. Stick with it! Proper trial and error are essential to finding out what works. Treat each new strategy like it could be the key to your child’s behavioral development.
- Keep your appointments with the behavior therapist. Consistency is necessary for building good behavior patterns. Consistency happens when you keep your appointments.
- Talk positively about the therapist and the ABA therapy visits. If you are excited about the ABA therapy visit, your child will be, too. A positive attitude goes a long way when you are working to learn something new.
- If you have questions between visits, don’t hesitate to ask. We are on your team and want to make sure you have the information you need to help your child grow developmentally and socially.
The visits from the behavior therapist are just a part of your child’s success.
You are your child’s best teacher. Discover Hope is there to come beside you so your child can grow developmentally and socially. If you think your child would benefit from a visit with a behavior therapist, please answer these simple questions to find out if your child is eligible for services from Discover Hope.