Extending the Reach of Early Intervention Training for Practitioners

Abstract

Early behavioral intervention, based on the methods of applied behavior analysis, has the strongest and most consistent scientific support as a means of teaching skills to young children with Autism Spectrum Disorder and reducing their restricted and maladaptive behavior. Though individual ABA-based treatment plans are usually developed, designed and supervised by a senior-level clinician, they are most often implemented by a practitioner, such as a parent, direct service provider, aide, or an early childhood professional from a related discipline. Unfortunately, few practitioner-orientated training programs are available to geographically disparate persons. Online distance-learning education offers a potential solution to this problem. Fifty-one individuals participated in an initial study of a short, three-module online course. The results showed a highly statistically significant difference between the mean pre-test and post-test score. The outcomes suggest the feasibility and user satisfaction of teaching BI knowledge acquisition online, and thus bolster confidence that future, larger-scale curricula aimed at teaching BI in a distance-learning format is warranted.

Using Technology to Expand and Enhance Applied Behavioral Analysis Programs for Children with Autism in Military Families

“…Several studies have evaluated similar virtual programs for training parents or technicians to implement behavioral interventions for children with ASD (Buzhardt & Heitzman-Powell, 2005;Hamad et al, 2010;Jang et al, 2012;Vismara et al, 2009). The current results replicate and extend the findings of those prior studies in several ways.…”

“…Parents were then required to score 90% or better on a 20-item test prior to beginning the second section of the module, which consisted of the parent practicing the skills targeted in the module with their child while receiving coaching and feedback from a professional via a telehealth connection. Other quasi-experimental studies have used similar methods to teach knowledge of behavioral intervention procedures or to train therapists to implement the Early Start Denver Model (Hamad, Serna, Morrison, & Fleming, 2010;Vismara, Young, Stahmer, Griffith, & Rodgers, 2009). We have found only one study in which an RCT was used to evaluate virtual training in the principles and procedures of ABA, but the dependent variable for that study was knowledge of ABA as measured on a multiple-choice test (Jang, Dixon, Tarbox, Granpeesheh, Kornack, & de Nocker, 2012).…”

Preparing Interventionists via Telepractice in Incidental Teaching for Children with Autism

“…The telepractice training programs typically included online instruction and immediate feedback provided via videoconferencing. Online instruction consisted of interactive learning activities (e.g., Hamad et al 2010;Heitzman-Powell et al 2014), and video models and exemplars (e.g., Hamad et al 2010). When providing feedback via videoconferencing, studies relied on immediate performance feedback with trainers observing interventionists implementing the target skill and immediately providing feedback on the implementation (Gibson et al 2010;Hay-Hansson and Eldevik 2013;Heitzman-Powell et al 2014;Machalicek et al 2009Machalicek et al , 2010Suess et al 2014;Wainer and Ingersoll 2014).…”

Review and Discussion of Strategies to Address Low Trainer‐to‐Staff Ratios

“…Promising studies of distance training have been conducted with comprehensive staff and parent training (e.g., Chen, Klein, & Minor, 2009;Hamad, Serna, Morrison, & Fleming, 2010), higher education (e.g., web-based Personalized System of Instruction, Eppler & Ironsmith, 2004; Blackboard® online platform, Walker & Rehfeldt, 2012), and telemedicine (videoconferencing; Barretto, Wacker, Harding, Lee, & Berg, 2006;Kelso, Fiechtl, Olsen, & Rule, 2009;Wacker et al, 2013). Chen et al (2009) evaluated the effects of a 16-week, primarily online course for training bachelor's level early interventionists to teach parents to implement naturalistic teaching strategies (Promoting Learning through Interaction [PLAI]; Klein, Chen, & Haney, 2000) with their infants diagnosed with multiple disabilities.…”