Author: Dave

I am passionate about empowering children with special needs and their families with skills and knowledge that they can use to improve their quality of life. This is why I am super excited to be sharing tips and strategies that relate to keeping your child with autism safe on the street. Learning to navigate the real world involves a lot of complex skills that we sometimes take for granted. For example, learning to determine when it is safe to cross the street requires the ability to attend to your environment, the ability to identify moving cars from cars that are still, the ability to identify the signal at the cross walk that lets you know it is safe to cross, among many, many, more. In some cases even more advanced problem solving is required because if the sign says it is safe to cross and a motorist continues through the intersection we need to be able to identify the moving car is approaching and that we need to wait for it to pass before crossing the street. So where do we begin?

Tip #1: The Learner is Never Wrong

I love the saying “the learner is never wrong” because of what it implies. Whenever considering teaching a new skill to a child or student we need to focus on that unique child’s strengths and weaknesses. Where do we need to boost up their skills and what do they already know so that we can capitalize on those strengths. Before going out to teach your child with autism how to cross the street safely, they should have some imitation skills, be able to respond to instructions and attend to you or a teacher amidst a lot of distractions (e.g., cars, background noise and pedestrians, just to name a few). Once you have determined they are ready to learn this important skill you would want to use things that are of interest to them and that you know align with their learning style. For example, are they a visual learner and if so, how can you incorporate visuals to maximize their learning potential in how you go out and practice crossing the street safely?

Tip #2: Simplify the Complex Skills

As mentioned earlier in the post, many of the skills that we use actually have many components, something we take for granted. In this case, teaching how to cross the street might involve the following steps:

1. Stop at the curb/crosswalk
2. Look at the crosswalk signal
3. Decide if it is safe to cross (e.g., does it say ‘walk,’ or does it say ‘stop’)
4. If the sign says walk, then look both ways
5. Decide if it is safe (e.g., is there a car moving or not)
6. Walk safely across the street (e.g., this means walking not running, perhaps holding your hand)

It is important to remember that these steps are just an example of what you might teach. You would individualize this based on the environment in which you live (e.g., if there is a crosswalk sign or crossing guard, or not) and the expectations you have as a family (e.g., to hold the hand or not). Teach this using tools that you know are effective with your unique child. For example, you may decide to print out a visual depiction for each of the steps and show them as you talk about it and practice. This depends on your child’s unique learning style. As with every skill that that we teach, it is never enough to just tell someone or show someone how to do it. We need to actually go out and practice.

Tip #3: Practice, Practice, Practice

Use every opportunity that you have to go out and practice this very important skill. I would also recommend that you set up specific times to go out and practice. You can use the visuals that you printed and go through each of the steps while you are out. If you notice that your child is struggling on a particular step, then practice that particular step at home even more. For example, if your child is not identifying the walk signal when you are out on the street, set up times to go over that at home.

Tip #4: Monitor Progress

In order to see how your child is doing on each of the steps it is a good idea to record how they do on each of the steps. You might print off a checklist with each of the steps that looks something like this:

You would calculate the number of times you recorded a Y over the total number of steps (e.g., in this case 6). For example, if I worked on this with my child and he did all of the steps he would get a 6/6. If he missed a step his overall score would be 5/6 or 83%. This score can then be used to monitor progress. I would also suggest that anytime you go out and practice you highlight whichever step(s) that they missed, if any. This will allow you to see if you need to work on something a little bit more before you go out and practice.

Tip #5: Notice the Good Stuff

Feedback is critical when you are teaching a new skill. Otherwise how is your child going to know how they are doing? This means that when they get it right we need to notice it and we need to be specific about what it is they did well. You can even use the visuals if you have them. You might say something like “I love the way you followed all of the steps of what to do when crossing the street safely! You stopped at the curb, looked at the signal…etc.” You may point to the visual as you tell them. If they missed a step remind them that next time they should try to remember what it is that they missed. Anytime they do one of the steps spontaneously, point it out to them and give lots of praise. Over time we can fade the praise out but it is really important when teaching a new skill, especially at the beginning.

Teaching children with autism how to navigate the complexities of the real world requires breaking down skills into manageable steps and adapting teaching strategies to their unique learning styles.

1. Understanding the Learner’s Needs
   Effective teaching starts with recognizing the child’s strengths, weaknesses, and learning style. Before teaching street safety, ensure they have basic skills like imitation, following instructions, and attending amidst distractions. Tailor your approach to their learning style—for visual learners, incorporate visual aids into the teaching process.

2. Breaking Down Complex Skills
   Skills like crossing the street involve multiple components: stopping at the curb, observing the signal, deciding if it’s safe to cross, looking both ways, checking for traffic, and walking across safely. Adapt these steps to your specific environment and family expectations. Use tools that resonate with your child’s learning style, such as visual representations of each step.

3. Practice and Repetition
   Consistent practice is essential. Create regular opportunities to practice street crossing and use visual aids to reinforce the steps. If your child struggles with a specific step, focus on practicing it at home.

4. Monitoring and Tracking Progress
   Track your child’s progress by recording their performance on each step using a checklist. Calculate their success rate and identify areas for improvement.

5. Positive Reinforcement
   Provide specific and positive feedback when your child performs a step correctly. Use visual aids to highlight their achievements and gently remind them if they miss a step. Celebrate spontaneous successes and gradually fade out praise as they master the skill.
   Suddha Mukhopadhyay M.A., BCBA

What is Consent? What is Assent?

Many people use the terms consent and assent interchangeably, but they hold distinct meanings. While both are crucial in ethical and legal contexts, understanding their differences is important. So, how do we assess both consent and assent? Let’s break it down.

Defining the Terms

At its core, consent refers to explicit permission or agreement to allow something to happen. It is commonly used in legal and ethical settings, particularly in scenarios involving care or treatment. In some cases, a person who is being cared for may not be able to provide consent themselves, and in such cases, a caregiver must give consent on their behalf.

Assent, on the other hand, represents a general agreement to participate, but it is not limited to a verbal yes. Assent includes both verbal and nonverbal communication, like body language or other actions, indicating willingness or reluctance to participate. While consent and assent can sometimes overlap, their differences are essential to acknowledge.

An Example of Consent and Assent

Consider the example of a child whose parents have given consent for them to play on the playground. The child verbally expresses interest in going outside and playing. However, once outside, the child lingers near the classroom door and avoids interacting with the equipment or other children. This illustrates that while parental consent was obtained, the child did not assent to the activity. There could be many reasons for this—perhaps the child didn’t like the heat, misunderstood the plan, or felt uncomfortable playing with others. The key point is recognizing the distinction and importance of both consent and assent.

Consent and Assent in Action

In a professional or therapeutic context, consent typically begins with a document called “informed consent.” This document outlines what will happen during an intervention, including potential risks and benefits, procedures involved, confidentiality policies, and who will be part of the treatment. The purpose is to ensure that all parties involved are fully informed and agree to the terms of the treatment.

While assent is not usually documented in an informed consent form, it remains just as important. Assent is ongoing and should be continually assessed, especially as treatment progresses. The frequency of formal assessment should be outlined in the informed consent, and it should be revisited whenever a goal is achieved or the treatment plan changes. Keep in mind, assent may look different for each individual, which is why building a strong rapport is essential to ensure their wishes are respected.

The Importance of Consent and Assent in Promoting Autonomy

It is vital to remember that both consent and assent are essential for upholding autonomy in decision-making. For example, before touching a child, it is crucial to ask for their consent. If that’s not feasible (as in situations where safety is at risk), it’s still necessary to inform the child about what is happening and why, even if they are unable to give explicit consent. Paying attention to their reactions and respecting their wishes in future decisions is key to maintaining a respectful and autonomous approach to care and interaction.

Consent vs. Assent: Understanding the Difference

While the terms “consent” and “assent” are often used interchangeably, they have distinct meanings. Both are crucial in ethical and legal contexts, particularly in healthcare and therapeutic settings.

Consent

Consent refers to explicit permission or agreement for something to happen. It is usually required in situations involving care or treatment. If a person is unable to provide consent themselves, a caregiver may do so on their behalf.

Assent

Assent signifies a general agreement to participate. It can be expressed through both verbal and nonverbal communication, such as body language or actions, indicating willingness or reluctance. While consent and assent can sometimes overlap, it is important to recognize their differences.

Example

A child whose parents have consented to them playing on the playground may still not assent to the activity. If the child expresses reluctance or avoidance once on the playground, it indicates a lack of assent, despite parental consent.

Consent and Assent in Practice

In professional settings, consent often begins with an “informed consent” document that outlines the details, risks, benefits, and procedures involved in a treatment or intervention. Assent, although not usually documented in the same way, is equally vital and should be continually assessed throughout the treatment process. The frequency of assent assessment should be outlined in the informed consent and revisited whenever the treatment plan changes.

Promoting Autonomy

Both consent and assent are crucial for upholding autonomy in decision-making. Even when explicit consent is not feasible, as in situations where safety is at risk, it is still important to inform the individual and respect their wishes as much as possible.

Suddha Mukhopadhyay M.A., BCBA

There’s a common misconception that individuals with special needs require a slower pace of instruction. While they may need more time to move through the curriculum, individual lessons shouldn’t be taught at a slower pace. In fact, slowing the pace can waste valuable instructional time and may even increase problem behaviors.

Higbee (2009) notes that “appropriately paced instruction helps students maintain attention to the instructor and instructional materials. Though student attention can be lost when instruction is happening too rapidly, it is most often lost when the pace of instruction is not rapid enough” (p. 20).

So how can you maintain a fast pace of instruction that is appropriate for your student? Here are some things to consider:

1. * **Prepare!** Organize your materials for quick and easy access. For example, I keep mastered skills on index cards so I can easily add maintenance questions into instruction. Organization is often the simplest way to increase efficiency in your session.
2. * **Take data.** Your goals are to increase attention and decrease problem behaviors. Try different paces of instruction and measure the behaviors you are targeting. For instance, if a student frequently grabs for my shirt during a session, I might try a pace of 15 questions per minute, then 20, then 25. Next, I would compare the rates of grabbing with each pace of instruction. Remember to intermix mastered skills with the target skill.
3. * **Record a session.** By taking video, you may see opportunities for increasing efficiency. You may also observe specific times at which problem behaviors tend to increase. For instance, perhaps problem behaviors occur when you turn to write data, but you didn’t recognize that pattern until you watched a recording later.
4. * **Use reinforcement effectively.** Usually, pace of instruction alone will not change behavior. Instead, pair it with reinforcement and be systematic with how you implement it.
5. * **If possible, get input from supervisors or the individual you are working with.** Supervisors may be able to observe your session and provide insight on how to increase your pace of instruction. The individual you are working with may be communicating that they are bored through misbehavior, stating “I’m bored,” or nonvocal behaviors such as yawning. This may be an indication that you need to provide more challenging material or increase the pace of instruction.

REFERENCES

Higbee, T. (2009). Establishing the prerequisites for normal language. In R. A. Rehfeldt, Y. Barnes-Holmes, & S.C. Hayes (Eds.), Derived relational responding applications for learners with autism and other developmental disabilities: A progressive guide to change (7-24). Oakland, CA: New Harbinger Publications, Inc.

Most adults think of toy play as a natural part of childhood. When my daughter was born, we were showered with plush animals, tea sets, and dress up clothes for her to use in play. But what happens when the child does not find toy play to be natural? Many children on the autism spectrum use toys non-functionally or repetitively. When I ask parents of children with ASD to tell me about their child’s play they often say “he doesn’t know how to use toys appropriately!” They then tell me about how the child may spin the wheels on the car while staring at the rotating objects. They tell me about the specific scripts the child uses to carry out a routine with their toys and subsequent tantrums if the routine is disrupted. Parents notice how this deficit in play impacts their ability to engage with peers or occupy their free time appropriately. Symbolic play occurs when the child uses objects or actions to represent other objects or actions. For example, a child using a doll as their baby and rocking the doll to sleep is an act of symbolic play. The doll is not alive, but the child is representing a baby. This skill is a core deficit in children with ASD. This means that they do not “naturally” or “easily” acquire the ability to use toys to represent other things. Development of symbolic play is crucial in early development and is tied to numerous subsequent skills:

Language

Symbolic play is highly correlated to language development. This means that the better the child’s ability to play representationally, the better the child’s language skills. There is also emerging evidence to support symbolic play as having a causal relationship to language

Social Development

As neurotypical children continue their learning about symbolic play and through symbolic play, children with ASD often struggle to relate to their peers and understand their play schemes. Some children with ASD may only engage peers in physical play (instead of symbolic play) or they may end up playing alone using their familiar play scripts.

Perspective-taking

Symbolic play allows the child early opportunities to take on the perspective of another being. If a child pretends to be a pirate, they being to talk and think of things a pirate might want/do. This early practice with perspective-taking allows the child to use this skill when interacting with peers and adults.

Meta-cognition and Problem Solving Skills

Meta-cognition is the ability to think about one’s own thinking. This is an essential skill when solving problems and planning one’s time. During play kids plan, organize and cognitively process through obstacles and mishaps with their toys.

Emotional Development

Through symbolic play, children can practice expressing emotion through the scenes they create. There is also some evidence suggesting that this early practice contributes to emotion understanding and empathy.

Clearly, children need play for growth and development. However, for children with ASD the development of symbolic play may be difficult and, even thought of as WORK!

Given the numerous skills that come out of symbolic play, we urge parents of children with ASD to consider the importance of toy play. Dedicate time and effort to engage your child in symbolic play. It is usually not easy at first! It might have been decades since you picked up an action figure and used him to fight off bad guys, but practice with your child.

Parents know that it is part of their job to help their child learn to read and do basic math. They would not let their child escape those tasks because they are hard. Please consider PLAY to be just as important and necessary for the child’s development. Even if it is work at first, insist the child play with you and in time, improvements may come not only in toy play but also in so many other key areas of development.

References

Jarrold, C., Boucher, J., & Smith, P. (1993). Symbolic play in autism: A review. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 23(2), 281-307.

Ungerer, J.A. & Sigman, M. (1981). Symbolic play and language comprehension in autistic children. Journal of the American Academy of Child Psychiatry, 20, 318-337.