Social Skills Series: Top Manners Your Child with Autism Can Learn

Learning good manners is important for every child, but it can be especially difficult with autism. There are some specific behaviors that you should teach your child with autism--they'll help them build good relationships and feel successful in the world. Check out this list of essential manners to teach any child, including those with autism!

What are manners?

Manners are considered a set of social skills that people use to show consideration for other people. They demonstrate respect, politeness, and understanding of social expectations. Teaching your child with autism manners is an integral part of their development due to the many challenges in society. Social challenges can make it hard for them to engage in conversations or make connections. Common difficulties include not using eye contact, not responding when called by name, not initiating interactions with others, and not accepting or declining food offers. Common manners can help your child connect in social situations. 

How to teach your child with autism about manners

It is essential to teach your child with autism about manners. This will make it easier to develop a good relationship with their peers and adults, as they will be able to form genuine friendships. 

You may want to teach your child the etiquette of good behavior and manners while they are young to practice these skills as they grow older. Showing your child how to be respectful and polite to others is a great way to teach them social skills. You must show your child how to behave around others, especially adults.  Teaching manners to a child with autism can be difficult. You might have to make your own system and guide them as they learn new skills. They will eventually have their own understanding of what "polite" looks like, but there are some things you can do to encourage politeness:

- Saying please and thank you

- Helping others

- Eating politely (using a spoon to scoop up food, not digging in with fingers)

- Not interrupting

- Sharing (even when they want it all for themselves)

Different ways to teach your child manners

It can be challenging to teach your child how to behave in public because they may not be able to read social cues. Here are some ways you can help your child learn manners:

- Model the polite behavior you expect your child to exhibit. This will help them learn and understand what is expected of them.

- Make sure they're clear on appropriate behavior by always giving clear, concise instructions two or three times in a row.

- Provide good examples that they might imitate, like telling them about when their behavior was acceptable or unacceptable. Sometimes children will imitate you, and they must copy the right things.

- Be consistent when giving consequences. If your child knows what is acceptable behavior and what's not, they'll be more likely to behave appropriately.

- Provide positive reinforcement when your child is behaving appropriately. 

Conclusion

Learning the social skills of a child with autism requires more than just understanding their developmental needs. Parents need to know how to break down social interactions and teach appropriate responses at each stage so that the child can learn how to effectively communicate, become more confident and self-reliant, and function in public. One of these social skills is manners, which they can learn through modeled behavior.

I hope you found this blog informative and the information helpful. If you are interested in learning more about Applied Behavior Analysis and the services Behavior Matters, LLC provides, please email info@behaviormattersllc.com.

Social Skills Series: Practice Making Eye Contact

Autism is a developmental disorder that affects the brain, impacting how an individual's brain processes and reacts to information. A critical aspect of this disorder is difficulty in social interaction. Because eye contact is such an integral part of communication, it can be difficult for people with autism to understand what others are feeling or thinking without it.

Difficulties Associated with Eye Contact

It is often challenging for individuals with autism to maintain eye contact, leading to feelings of discomfort, shyness, and insecurity. Eye contact is a powerful social cue necessary for connecting with others. It's said that a person with autism often has difficulties picking up on social cues from facial expressions and body language. This may make it challenging to interpret what we say or understand when telling them something important.

Eye contact is an essential part of human communication. Autistic individuals are often nervous and uncomfortable with eye contact, but they can learn how to do so in a healthy way. Try not to interrupt the person when they're looking away to make this process easier. Wait until they look back at you before saying anything else. This will give them time to process what you're saying and formulate a response.

ABA Therapy Techniques to Improve Eye Contact

ABA therapy techniques have been developed to help people with autism work on this skill. One approach is assigning them a job where they must make eye contact, such as sitting by a store clerk or cashier and making small talk while waiting in line. Another is assigning them a set period to practice eye contact throughout the day, such as 15 minutes per day at first, gradually increasing the period until they can do it for an hour.

5 Tips to Practice Eye Contact

Here are five  tips for working on eye contact

1. Have a toy or something they are interested in on the other side of the room and encourage them to find it by looking at you. 
2. If you are in a public place and your child isn't looking at you, try saying 'I want to look at you' in a playful voice, and then try to get them to make eye contact with you. 
3. Try not to be your child's only source of social interaction-get some one-on-one playtime with another child or adult. 
4. When you are with someone interacting with your child, make eye contact with your child, and direct your attention to that person. This is a great way to encourage them to share their interest in that person. 
5. When talking to someone, direct your attention to the other person. If you want your child to do this, try having them look at you and then turn your face towards the person you are talking to. 

All young children need a lot of encouragement to spend time with other people, even when having fun, because they often don't consider it necessary. But over time, when you give them positive experiences, they will likely come to enjoy it on their own. 

Conclusion

Individuals with autism have a difficult time maintaining eye contact. Eye contact is an essential social signal for human beings, so this is a problem for people with autism. However, there are ways to work on eye contact skills by making time throughout the day to practice.

I hope you found this blog informative and the information helpful. If you are interested in learning more about Applied Behavior Analysis and the services Behavior Matters, LLC provides, please email info@behaviormattersllc.com.

Social Skills Series: Why Your Child Needs to Learn Spatial Awareness

 As a parent, you may not realize the many life skills your child's spatial awareness develops. It has been proven that this crucial skill is vital to understanding objects and their placement in space, and for kids who grow older, it can help with everything from navigating a crowded room to reading maps and graphs.

What is spatial awareness?

Spatial awareness is knowing one's own location, spatial orientation, or sense of direction. It can be determined by asking questions about the surroundings. Spatial cognition is crucial for everyone ages, but children need to develop at a young age. This incredible skill will help them grow up to become extraordinary individuals.

Why is spatial awareness important for children?

Spatial awareness is the ability to know where one's body is about their surroundings. It helps us navigate through space, understand what direction we're headed, and find our way back home. Kids who are adept at spatial awareness are more prepared to succeed in school because it helps with language, math, and even reading comprehension.

ABA Therapy for Spatial Awareness

ABA is a behavioral therapy that helps children develop skills to manage their external and internal responses to stimulations in their environment. This includes providing a systematic program of rewards and consequences to help a child learn from past experiences. One of the critical components of this therapy is spatial awareness, which teaches children how to process information from their five senses to understand what they see, hear, taste, touch, and smell. One of the most essential skills children need to learn is spatial awareness. When they cannot understand where objects are about themselves, it can cause difficulties in their everyday lives. 

Spatial Awareness in Social Setting

Children need to learn the concept of spatial awareness in social settings. This is because they will be expected to understand interpersonal space, including how close or far away they should stand from another person. From an early age, children should be taught that physical closeness is not always an

indication of intimacy.  It is a crucial skill for children because it helps them develop their sense of self, body orientation, spatial reasoning, problem-solving abilities, social skills, etc.

Ways to improve spatial awareness with ABA Therapy

Children with autism spectrum disorder may have less developed spatial awareness skills, which can be a challenge in daily life. ABA therapy teaches children about where things are in their environment and how to interact with those things. Children who don't have spatial awareness usually need help from others regularly. For example, guiding them as they walk down a corridor or through a room filled with furniture. This can limit their independence and prevent them from being as successful as other children in daily life. Spatial awareness helps humans to understand what is happening around them- how objects move and how to use those objects. A parent teaching a child to ride a bike, for example, will often talk the child through each step of the activity. This is spatial awareness training as the parent guides their child through steps- moving from one position to another. It connects to our understanding of the world and allows us to predict where objects are when they are not under direct observation. 

Conclusion

Spatial awareness is critical because it involves the skills of perception, orientation, attention, memory, and mental imagery. These are necessary skills for understanding how objects are related in space. Children who have these skills are more intuitive when figuring out what’s happening in their environments.

I hope you found this blog informative and the information helpful. If you are interested in learning more about Applied Behavior Analysis and the services Behavior Matters, LLC provides, please email info@behaviormattersllc.com.

Social Skills Series: Teach Kids To Follow Directions

As a parent, you might have noticed that your child has difficulty following directions. This may be because your child is not determined enough or does not know what to do when they get instruction from you. This article will explore teaching children to follow directions through applied behavior analysis. 

What is Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA) therapy, and what does it do?

Applied Behavior Analysis is a type of therapy that analyzes people's behavior with different disorders, such as autism, to teach these persons to change their behavior. Focusing on specific behaviors and their antecedents, consequences, or facilitators can help patients identify the cause for their behaviors. From there, therapists will give the patient opportunities for reinforcement after engaging in more desirable behaviors.

How to use ABA to teach kids to follow directions

Applied behavioral analysis is a systematic process of analyzing the behavior of people. The goal is to change their behavior by changing the environment. This technique teaches kids to do tasks by providing step-by-step instructions. The steps are broken down into smaller, more easily accomplished pieces. This helps the person feel that what they are doing is a manageable task and realize that they can do it. For instance, if a child misbehaves when you tell them to do something, they might not remember what you told them or figure out how to do it. In these cases, the program may have a parent prompt their child with instructions at certain times. This technique will help your children understand what they need to do so they don't forget.  

Ways parents can implement the technique at home.

Behavior Analysis is a technique that focuses on improving or changing observable behaviors. Parents can use Behavior Analysis to teach kids to follow directions. The first step is identifying the behavior to be changed, like not taking care of their toys after playing with them. The next step is coming up with an antecedent - what happens before the undesirable behavior? For example, if the child only cleans up after playing when told, "getting out of bed" would be the antecedent. Next, parents identify the consequence for the desirable behaviors (e.g., what follows "getting out of bed?") and implement that consequence when the desired behavior occurs. If the child quickly cleans up after playing with their toys, praise and a five-minute video game break will follow. If they don't clean up, the parent will have to remind and assist them in cleaning up. If they still do not clean up, then the consequence is that they will be required to pick up all their toys before they are allowed to play with them again. This is a behavioral approach because it relies on shaping. 

Conclusion

Behavior analysis is a great way to teach kids to follow directions, but they must be introduced correctly. First, ask the child to repeat what they are supposed to do after being given a direction. If they have not followed the directions, have them do so individually. Next, ask the child if they know what you are asking them to do or if they need assistance with anything before proceeding. Lastly, reinforce positive behavior with praise and rewards for following directions.

I hope you found this blog informative and the information helpful. If you are interested in learning more about Applied Behavior Analysis and the services Behavior Matters, LLC provides, please email info@behaviormattersllc.com.