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Parents

Last updated: 2010-05-29

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Why Run an ABA Program?

There are three reasons to run an ABA program for your child. The first is that you want to give your child the best chances for recovery. Control group – treatment group studies have shown that up to 47% of children with autism can recover to the point that they are indistinguishable from their peers. By “recovery” we mean that they do not require aides at school, they have friends, they enjoy all of life’s pleasures without assistance. The directors of the ABA SN have met children who have recovered. We know this can happen.

The second reason is that you want your child with autism to reach his or her fullest potential. It can be very difficult for children with autism to learn, and even more difficult if they have a lower IQ. ABA can break tasks down to what ever level the child needs, so that learning is easier. All children doing ABA progress if they have a good consultant who can recognize their needs and design programs to target those needs. If progress is not being made, the data will show this and the consultant will implement a new tactic.

The third reason is that living with autism behaviors can be very hard on the family. ABA can help reduce or even eliminate undesirable behaviors of any kind (self injury, screaming, biting, extreme fears, rigidity, nose picking…). This can dramatically improve the quality of family life and the lower stress levels in parents. A strong, healthy family is the best gift we can give a child with autism.

My Child has Autism…What Now?

Whether or not you have a full diagnosis or assessment completed, if your child has a developmental delay, it is imperative that you start the ball rolling on an ABA program. It will take time to get things in place.

Here is a checklist of things to do:

__ See “Milburn Drysdale’s” website Autism Funding in BC (http://asdfunding.com) and read as much as possible for information on where to get diagnosis and for information on all financial issues.

__ Read “Let Me Hear Your Voice” by Catherine Maurice (easy to get at the public library or ASBC). For motivational purposes, but also for understanding why you will do this and how to be a savvy consumer.

__ Register with the ABA Support Network and let us know if you need a consultant. Sometimes we get a heads up on new people coming to town. We will also send you Dr. Sabrina Freeman’s video called Autism: What do I do now? A no nonsense roadmap to fast-tracking your child’s medically necessary autism treatment.

__ Three good books that will help you better understand ABA are:

  • Behavioral Intervention for Young Children with Autism by Catherine Maurice, Gina Green and Stephen Luce.
  • A Work In Progress by Ron Leaf and John McEachin.
  • Teaching Individuals with Developmental Delays – Basic Intervention Techniques by Ivar Lovaas.

__ Read Careers in ABA to understand the components of the ABA team.

__ Attend as many ABA workshops and presentations as possible. The ABA SN will send notices to all members of any upcoming events. See the calendar.

Preparing your ABA team

First, you will have to find a well qualified ABA consultant. You can download the RASP list http://www.actcommunity.net/RASP/Parents/default.htm from ACT BC, but it is not easy to sort out who is really well qualified. Use the Questions for Interviewing Consultants to help you better understand what you want to look for. You may also want to look at the ABA consumer guidelines. There is a chapter devoted to this issue in Maurices book Behavioral Interventions. Some consultants provide profiles to help narrow down who to call.

Once you have an ABA consultant lined up, you will need to hire a team of Behavior Interventionists (BIs) to work one-on-one with your child. See Connecting Families and Therapists below. New teams should start with 4 to 8 BIs as you may lose one or two within the first month. A child will often start with 20 hours and work up to nearly 40 within a few months. Number of hours will be determined by your consultant. It is important that BIs have at least 3 shifts per week if they are new, so that they get experience intensively. This is a difficult balance to work out. You don’t want to be short of BIs, but you also need to offer enough hours to the BIs. Better to be overbooked, than lose therapy hours.

Upload the list of therapist interview questions. If you download the word document, you can add or remove from this document as you need. You may also be interested in the therapists expectations and ads for therapists.

You can advertise for BIs at local colleges or universities (preferably in the Psychology dept), Starbucks coffee shops, on Craigslist, in the local newspaper. Here are some examples of therapist ads. Or, you can download the Careers in ABA flyer.

For the most part, you will be looking for “green” BIs (those who don’t have any experience). One advantage to this is that the BI will be loyal to your family first and will usually stay longer on the team. You do need at least one experienced BI to be your lead therapist. It is best to look for your experienced BI through featbc chat, through your contacts you make at ABA SN meetings, or through your consultant.

Connecting Families and Therapists

Popular places for both families and therapists to post their requirements and availability are:

  • FEAT of BC classified board (you must register to use the chat boards)
  • Craigslist you can choose a craigslist in your city if you do not live in Vancouver. Most ads seem to be in “Job postings” under “education”.
  • Support Worker Central online database
  • Local newspapers/classifieds and sometimes there are flyers or notices in local shops, coffee houses, universities and colleges, etc.

Starting Up

Usually your consultant will spend 8 hours or so assessing your child and developing programs, then he/she will meet with the new team and teach them how to deliver the programs. If you have a lead therapist, that person can work with all BIs for the first month to make sure they are all delivering the programs consistently. This is less expensive than paying the consultant to do it, and just as effective (besides, the consultant probably won’t have time to do it). The consultant can overlap the new therapist once they have been trained up, to tweek any outstanding issues.

The next step is to set up the administration of your team. Make sure you read through Autism Funding in BC which is a website designed by a parent (with parent input). Keep networking with other parents to get ideas on how to set up the therapy room, how to keep track of expenses etc. The ABA Support Network will inform you of any workshops on team administration.

Keeping the team going

Once you have your team up and running, you will have to act as the child’s case manager. You will be the one to make sure everyone is doing their job and doing it well. This is not a job that parents have wanted to have, but your child’s team will work best if you are involved. You will need to “let go” of people who are not working out. This includes BI’s as well as consultants. Always remember that you are not married to your consultant.

If a BI is having difficulty, it might be they simply need more training. It is important to remember this. Growing a green BI is not easy, but the long term results can be fantastic.

If you are feeling that something is not quite right with your team, or you want to discuss any concerns, feel free to contact the ABA SN or come to one of the monthly meetings to talk with experienced parents.

You will need to come to terms with financing your team. There are various sources of funding and you can read about these in asdfunding.com. Hopefully you have hired therapists who are in this for the love of what they do and not for the money. A family might be able to throw money at an excellent ABA program for 3 years, but if your child does not recover, you will be wanting to continue ABA support for many years to come. You must then learn how to get the most out of your money without compromising your child’s program.

Please feel free to contact the ABA Support Network at any time if you have any questions or concerns.