Talk Autism by Debbie
Let's talk about Autism. The ups and downs for guiding an individual that is on the spectrum. Let's not forget about the parents and other children during out talks.
Talk Autism by Debbie
From Aggression to Expression: Fostering Development
Hi everyone. I hope things are going well for you today. What we're going to talk about in the next 10 minutes is unsafe behavior, and I know we've all seen it in our child in one form or the other. So we're going to talk about two different things with unsafe behavior One that they inject on other people or that they do to themselves, and we've seen both of that. So what we're going to talk about first is injuries to others.
Speaker 1:So if your child is like hitting, biting, hurting other people or sometimes to get their attention, if you remember one of my podcasts, I talked about the reasons why they have the behaviors, and there's like four of them, and one of them is access to something, they want something or they want your attention or something of that nature. So we're going to first block that. So just, you know a defensive place. Let's say let's give an example, though let's redo that for a minute that they're going to hit you. So you're sitting at your desk or your table and you can see them coming up with their fists and they go to, you know, hit you somewhere with their fists. So what you do is you block that and kind of turn away, your head away, and then show them. You know, if they want your attention, just to tap and then keep ignoring them, don't acknowledge that they're there or that how they are trying to get your attention but once they do the correct thing, say tap, please, you can use your voice too. Then look at them and say, yes, may I help you? Or whatever the case may be. Now, if they go to hit another child, then that could be a different reason why they are doing that Maybe not get their attention, but maybe they want something, they want their toy, or they don't want them sitting next to them or something like that. So again, then you have to use words, you have to say no, that's not how we do that. What do we need to say? And then voice what they need to say, say, may I have that? Can we share those kind of type of things that you need to work on?
Speaker 1:So it's basically you block, redirect and then reinforce the behavior, and then once they, you know, do and then reinforce the behavior. And then, once they, you know, do what they're supposed to do, and the more that they do, that you want to keep rewarding them and we'll talk a little more about that in a minute, when given a chance to try it again and made a correct decision. We do want them to be rewarded, but don't let me how. I want to say that it's not really big. You know the reward would be you would acknowledge them. Yes, what can I help you with? But let's say that they come to you and they do the tap. Then you really want to make a big deal out of it. Yay, thank you for doing that. That was really good and that's what we want to see. We want to see if they do correct it too, but not as much as they do it the first time.
Speaker 1:So make sure, if they come and they do it the first time, that you really commend them on that is self-injury behaviors. That is something like a lot of kids, and I've just had a student that did this and headbanging and at first it would scare the jeebies right out of me. I mean it's like because he would really hit his head. And so what you want to do, you know, like if we're in a school or anything, not so much a parent you know you're not to touch the kids and stuff, but we have to make sure they're safe, and so maybe just gently, you know, put your hand there and this can be done at home too your hand, so they don't keep banging and just kind of lean them towards there. We don't want them to hurt themselves.
Speaker 1:So the first attempt is safety, of course, and you want to interrupt, you want to block that behavior, maybe with just a light touch and, if possible, just a little bit of moving away of the area so he cannot bang his head, or he or she Redirect it with a task, something that they want to do, not something that they don't want to do. If they were working on something and they didn't want to do it and they start banging their head, you don't want to stop the banging and then go back to the task that they didn't want to do. You want to redirect them into something that they want to do to get them away from that behavior. Then go back into the task that you want to do. So, remember, if they're hitting, pinching, biting, they want access to something, most likely. So you got to build that communication. You got to maintain safety for yourself, for the other children in the home or at in the classroom, and for themselves too. So there's a lot of different ways.
Speaker 1:I know that schools if you have somebody that because I did have that was pretty violent. He hit, hit a lot and I was always blocking because, you know, a lot of times it wasn't always directed to me but it was directed to another child and I had to protect that child. Especially some of them were a lot younger and a lot smaller, and so I would stand in between until we could get some help. And it was recommended to me to take a course. They have courses at places that you work to teach you how to do things properly and not hurt a child. So one of the things you want to do the first thing, because we want to get these behaviors under control. That is top priority. It comes before even education or anything else. You have to get these behaviors under control because if not, everything else in life suffers.
Speaker 1:So the first thing is you want to build communication. You want to be able to. If they're verbal, let's say they're verbal and then I'll work on nonverbal. But for verbal, you want to model how they should approach somebody, not just grab and take away and run or hurt a hit. You want to say teach them how to ask for something, or can I have that please, may I sit down? Things like that. You know that you want to be able to model them, but when you model it, you want them to say it too. So you want them to repeat it. So if they're listening to you, just say, well, you have to say it too. You know it's not just you saying it, they have to say it too. So verbally correct the sentence if it's not appropriate, and so you know. If they're mean, give me that. I want that. You can't have a calling another student names or sibling names. You need to be able to change that vocabulary and say this is not how we talk. We talk like this, you know, and can I please have that when you're done? Or something like that.
Speaker 1:So the second thing is to teach tolerance, and I talked about this in my last podcast. One of the things you can do when we're doing different types of things like if they did a task and then they're going to get something, say we're going to wait one minute, set a little timer and when the minute's done, this will help teach tolerance with them. So that's one reason I always say you know if you can build in some wait time here or there along the way we all have to wait here and there anyway. But teach them. You need to teach them how to wait. Yes, you can have a Popsicle, but we're going to wait one minute, okay. Or we're going to wait two minutes and then do it. So when the two minutes up, you can have it and after a while they get used to it and they understand it. So understand it and also teach turn taking, how to take turns. A good way to do that and we don't do it much anymore is board games. If you can just play one simple board game and have them, teach them to learn how to take turns, I've been doing that on Fridays in my classrooms. We've been getting out board games and I was a little surprised on how they didn't understand how to take turns or what goes next and little simple things that sometimes you take for granted that they do know and they don't not with our electronics anymore. But that's a good way to teach turn taking. Build in a reward system. Teach turn taking, build in a reward system. So when they do take turns or they do wait, of course, if they're waiting for a treat, you're giving them a treat. But give them a praise with a treat, say good job, waiting for that, you did well, those kinds of things.
Speaker 1:The third thing is maintaining safety Safety for them, safety for you. So if they're exhibiting some type of behavior, for example, if I have a student that's throwing chairs, I'm going to get the other kids out of the room. I don't want them to be injured or hurt. If that child is doing self-injury to her or him, then I'm going to do what I can to remove that area or whatever they have to in their hand or whatever the case may be, to help ensure that they are safe too. I've had a child that just recently would self-injure herself, but it was almost like she didn't realize what she was doing and she started crying and I said, well, you're pulling your own hair, you know, don't pull your hair. And kind of just gently move her hand, you know. And just telling her that made a difference, like, oh, this is happening, you know. So we need to make sure that our surroundings are safe, that they're not going to get into something that could hurt them or hurt another child or hurt you, that they're not going to get into something that could hurt them or hurt another child or hurt you, and you know, to block and turn away until the behavior is under control.
Speaker 1:Also, create a schedule. If you're seeing this type of behavior happening again and again, try to figure out why. Why is it happening always at noon on Monday, tuesday, wednesday? So what's going on? Or maybe it's always on Monday morning in the classroom at nine o'clock or something like that. So think about what's happening. Did they have breakfast? Could that be something? They're hungry and kind of set a schedule and figure out okay, every day at this time they are hitting another student or throwing a chair or whatever the case may be.
Speaker 1:And then the next day or so, if it's happening at a certain time in every day, then try to and build in a reward for that time and say, hey, you know you're going to go 20 minutes without hurting yourself or doing this and that and you're going to get a reward today for doing that. And then do it right away. Make sure your rewards are right as soon as possible. You know the tip of the iceberg kind of thing to kind of get look at different ways to help with self-injury or being injured with other people is maintain safety is the first thing. Build that communication, you know. Build those tolerance, to be able to weigh and be patient and then, of course, maintain safety at all costs. So that's it for this podcast.
Speaker 1:I will be looking into the next ones that I'll be doing around spring break, which is in March for us, is strategies to increase communication skills, strategies to increase independence and strategies to increase communication skills, strategies to increase independence and strategies to increase social skills. So we're going to work on that. So like, for example, independence would be personal teaching, building to better behaviors, breaking down skills, problem solving, modeling, playing skills, those kind of things. And for communication would be modeling, again, personal teaching, joint attention, play, those things to help with our kids. I hope this helps some way with these podcasts. I don't have the cure, of course. I don't have all the answers, but I just put out things that I learned and hope that it helps you too. So have a blessed day and I will talk to you real soon. Bye-bye.
