ABA... What Exactly Is It?

ABA is a method of teaching children with ASD in a manner that is meaningful to them. I'm a little bit too tired right now to go into how ABA is structured and how it works but, I have to say that this program has been a lifesaver for our son -- actually, our entire family.

My son is also high functioning. He started ABA when he was 4 and was talking but a lot of it was labeling which is not very functional. He could ask for "more" but couldn't tell us other things like if he felt sick, was hungry, tired or cold -- stuff that other parents of 4-year olds take for granted. He had a lot of attentional issues and behavior issues also. No stranger danger, had a tendency of disrobing when he was frustrated or tired (not very good when we are at some place like the park or pump-it-up), and just a lot of other things that gave him the autism diagnosis. But he also was very cute and had a lot of strong skills as well.

We have been doing ABA now for 3+ years and I credit it for him being able to attend a general ed 2nd grade class 99% (with special ed support), being able to start conversations with other people and maybe have a 3 or 4 part exchage, improving his handwriting and his cognitive skills (so that he can be in general ed), helping him learn how to ride his bike (although he still has training wheels, but that pedalling motion is really tough for a kid with motor planning issues), and a host of other skills that he has picked up along the way.

We have been lucky enough to have a consultant and tutors who really like my son and see him for who he is and not just as a diagnosis. As a result, our ABA program is tailored to fit his skills and deficits. Right now some of the things we are working on handwriting (always a work in progress), reading out loud and asking/answering questions, how to tell whether something he wants to talk about is interesting to another person, answering the phone and having a conversation, riding his bike, and staying on task while doing classwork. We have been doing ABA for 3+ years now and have gone through a lot of programs. Everything from verbal and and non-verbal imitation, telling jokes, starting a conversation, giving instructions, learning to draw.

Anyway, there's a lot I can tell you about the program but, if you have any specific questions, please feel free to PM me and I'll be glad to answer them them for you.

Hope this helps.

Have you loooked into Floortime? It is a method developed by Stanley Greenspan for kids with ASD and other delays to enhance social communication.

You are wise to search out different methods of teaching your child with special needs. When I first saw ABA in a home with a child with autism I was amazed, but then over the years as I continued to see it in homes with different children, I realized that it is very labor intense for the mom, or whomever is going to be doing this intense training and that concerned me. For me, it also did not feel natural. It didn't have the ebb and flow of my lifestyle and me and a child that I would be working with.
I much prefer Floortime by Stanely Greenspan. You can access it through the Play Project www.playproject.org; Dr. Richard Solomon is the founder of Play Project and there are many facilities that teach this method as you will see on the website. It is a play based, child friendly program. This was a much better fit for me and the children I worked with.

My 6 year old twins are on the spectrum and had speech, OT, and developmental tx starting at about 18 months (though not specifically ABA). They had special ed preschool in our school district for 2 years, which was a huge help in preparing for kindergarten.

I recommend a Hanen program (there are several prorgams, we did More Than Words, but another one is called Talkability), you can read more on their website and see the textbooks. Our school district offered the course for free but others charge.

I also recommend the "Model Me" videos. They teach how to act in social situations and boys really love them. There is a website. Our school psychologist has a set and let's us borrow them.

My boys are in typical kindrrgarten with a parapro. They use noise reducing headphones during loud situations (music class, assemblies), have break times built in to their day, and also just starting using an alphasmart board (like a word processor) because of their handwriting. They also do hanwriting without tears.

Hope that is helpful!

Why does she not attend her town's developmental/disabled preschool? Since she has a diagnosis there should be no issue and they would give her appropriate therapy.