Teaching Students with Autism
Discrete Trial Training & Naturalistic
Teaching Strategies

Teaching Students w/Autism
• What is Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA)?
• What are some things you might see in a classroom where the principles of ABA are being used?

Teaching Students w/Autism
• “Applied Behavior Analysis is the process of systematically applying interventions based upon the principles of learning theory to improve socially significant behaviors to a meaningful degree, and to demonstrate that the interventions employed are responsible for the improvement in behavior.”
Baer, Wolf & Risley, 1968

Teaching Students w/Autism
• The 11 Established Treatments for ASD listed by The
National Standards Project are:
- Antecedent Package
- Behavioral Package
- Comprehensive Behavioral Treatment for Young Children
- Joint Attention Intervention
- Modeling
- Naturalistic Teaching Strategies
- Peer Training Package
- Pivotal Response Treatment
- Schedules
-Self-management
-Story-based Intervention Package

Teaching Students w/Autism
• All of these established treatments have at least some basis in the behavioral literature and/or make use of strategies described in the behavioral literature
• They all employ the following:
- Use of positive reinforcement (R+)
- Individualized instruction
-Data based decision making

Teaching Students w/Autism
• What is Discrete Trial Training (DTT)?
• Are DTI and ABA the same thing?

Teaching Students w/Autism
• Discrete Trial Training (DTT) is a method of teaching in simplified steps. Instead of teaching an entire skill in one go, the skill is broken down and “built-up” using discrete trials that teach each step one at a time (Smith, 2001).
• Discrete Trial Training is commonly used within
Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA) but it is important to note that ABA is not Discrete Trial
Training. ABA uses DTT as one method of teaching but there are many other methods used within ABA as well.

Teaching Students with Autism
• Using what we have discussed so far, practice explaining ABA and Discrete Trial Training as if you were talking to a parent.

Discrete Trial Training
• Pioneered by the work of Dr. Ivar Lovass at UCLA.
• Discrete trials contain 3 distinct parts:
– An antecedent which is a clear, simple instruction provided to the student
– A specific behavior that we expect the student to perform in response to our instruction
– A consequence; either positive reinforcement for correct responses or a correction for incorrect responses.
• Still one of the most researched and relied upon methods for teaching students with autism.

Discrete Trial Training
• So why is “discrete trial” a “bad word” in so many schools?

Discrete Trial Training
• There are several common criticisms of DTT:
- “It’s boring”
- “It doesn’t teach language”
- “It turns kids into robots”
- “It doesn’t look natural”

Discrete Trial Training
• Many of these criticisms are based off of historical aspects of DTT which are no longer used today
– “SD voice”
– “Mass trialing”
– “No, No, Prompt”
– “Intertrial Pause”
– “Trial by Trial Data Collection”

Discrete Trial Training
• In the last 10 years, the application of the theory of verbal behavior has significantly changed the way DTT is applied to children on the spectrum.
• The verbal behavior approach uses a combination of DTT and Natural Environment
Teaching (NET) to address the needs of students with autism.

Teaching Students w/Autism
• So what are some of the changes that have been made to DTT?
• How do we use a combination of DTT and NET in the classroom?

DTT: Pairing
• Pairing is the process of building cooperation and rapport by providing the student with access to their preferred items and activities.
• Differs from historical DTT in that the instructor becomes associated with the students preferences rather than with the termination of preferred activities and a high number of demands.
• Demands are introduced slowly and are at first very simple and short.

DTT: Pairing
• Ideas for pairing in the classroon
– Become aware of each student’s individual preferences by either asking them or performing a preference assessment
– Approach students during “downtime” and provide access to favorite items and activities without placing demands
– Approach during a students favorite activities and enhance the experience

DTT: Pairing
• Preference assessment demonstration and practice
– MSWO for higher functioning students
– Forced choice for lower functioning students
– Remember that motivation shifts constantly

DTT: Task Interspersal
• Task interspersal means quickly shifting from one type of trial to another rather than presenting multiple trials of the same task in a row.
• Intersperse several maintenance tasks to help avoid challenging behaviors and to build behavioral momentum
• Intersperse trials with different verbal operants to ensure that students are building listener discrimination skills

DTT: Task Interspersal
• Using task interspersal in the classroom
DEMONSTRATION o Individual o Group

DTT: Pacing
• Present trials quickly to increase student engagement and reduce self-stimulatory behavior
• Be sure, however, to keep your instructions clear.
• Choose a data collection system that will allow you to teach at a quick pace

DTT: Data Collection
• Shift to greater use of probe data to allow for more natural and faster teaching
• First trial probe – a test is done on the first presentation of the task. If correct, no need to teach further. If prompting is required this skill is targeted for teaching that day. Graphed as a percentage either 0 or 100.
• Weekly probe – skills are taught every day, except for on testing day. On testing day, a few skills are presented without feedback and the percentage of correct responses for each specific skill are graphed

DTT: Data Collection
• Collecting probe data in the classroom
DEMONSTRATION o First trial probe o Weekly probe

DTT: Data Collection
• Especially helpful for collecting data on skills that would be “ridiculous” to present over and over again i.e. play skills, socialization skills
• Teacher preference and experience are, of course, still taken into consideration.

Natural Environment Teaching
• Natural Environment Teaching uses the following strategies:
– Focusing on the child’s immediate interests and activities as a guide for instructions
– Loose structure
– Done in the typical environment
– Stresses variation in materials and responses
– Still has specific consequences (R+ or correction)

Natural Environment Teaching
• Always use NET when teaching:
– Mand skills (requesting)
– Intraverbals (conversation skills)
– Play skills (in preschool)
– Socialization skills
– And always generalize skills taught in discrete trial by using natural environment teaching strategies

Natural Environment Teaching
• Using NET in the classroom
DEMONSTRATION o Using NET to promote generalization

Natural Environment Teaching
• REMEMBER
– NET and DTT should be done simultaneously
– Everyone in the classroom should be familiar with both types of strategies and applying them to the child in the classroom.

Teaching Students with Autism
• PRACTICE TIME!!!!!
– Choose a general skill
– Break it down into components to teach in DTT
– Describe your teaching procedure including materials used, reinforcers used, schedule of reinforcement, prompts you will use to correct, etc
– Describe your teaching procedure for promoting generalization in the NET in the same way that you described your DTT procedure
– Practice on each other (don’t make it easy ;-)

Teaching Students with Autism
QUESTIONS?????