Following a Child’s Motivation

Another biggie that goes hand in hand with last weeks post. This ends up high on my hierarchy of things to teach, things to refine, and things to ensure are being done when I take over supervision of staff, and even when I am training brand new staff to the field.

While it’s all well and good to “know” what the child likes; it’s not sufficient to decide what they want to work for. This is why I focus so heavily on contriving motivation, and following the child’s lead. Maybe every session before they’ve wanted a particular toy, but that isn’t necessarily the case this day. If you make that assumption, when you go to ‘use’ that toy to encourage a response, they may not go through with the response because they don't a toy. This results in a prompted data point that was altogether un-necessary. Sorry, I got high level there!

What we (ABA practitioners) never want to get into is deciding for the child. Even in the very early days of newbie service, children will look, lean, or reach for what they’re interested in. When they are not capable of anymore - we do accept this. Once they have the capacity to request, this becomes the only way they get what they want. However, in every case: we have to be sure to follow their motivation. Their desires. Their wishes. That day. That moment. That minute. That second. Then we can squeeze out maximum potential.