Every child needs a safe home. With most kids, safety follows a familiar path: they explore, a parent moves things up high or gives a firm "no," a bump or two teaches its own lesson, and before long the curiosity wears off. For a child with autism, safety can be more complex. Autism can come with behaviors that typical childproofing isn't built for: elopement (wandering or bolting from a safe place), climbing and other dangerous behaviors, self-injury, and aggression. The earlier these...

Part 3 of 3 in our series on rapport across the ABA team. In Part 1, we named the problem: rapport gets treated as optional at every level of an ABA team. In Part 2, we looked at the fix for the BCBA-parent relationship. Here, we close the loop with the other relationship that shapes a case just as much: the one between a BCBA and the Behavior Technicians they supervise. Guidance, Not Constant Direction A BCBA's job is to provide guidance, not to narrate every moment of a session. In many...

Saying please and thank you is polite, but is it actually necessary? A closer look at where social politeness markers rank against real functional communication skills for a child with autism.