Can ABA Help with School Readiness?

A major goal for many young children who have autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is to build the skills that are necessary so they can navigate a traditional school environment with confidence and some independence.

Compared to their neurotypical peers, children with autism often face unique challenges in this regard, including trouble communicating and interacting with others. Some children on the autism spectrum must overcome other obstacles to entering a traditional classroom.

Yet, attending school regularly has many benefits for children with autism, which is why getting them ready to enter that environment is such a strong focus of early intervention programs such as applied behavior analysis (ABA therapy).

But, how can ABA therapy help with school readiness? We discuss below some ways in which the gold standard treatment for children with ASD helps patients prepare for school.

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Why is School Readiness Important?

So much focus is put on school readiness for young children — regardless of their developmental abilities — because doing so sets them up for long-term success in the classroom. Not only does school teach children important academic subjects, it also teaches them important social-emotional skills as well.

In fact, a large portion of early schooling revolves around social-emotional studies, rather than on mathematics or science, for example.

For children with autism, this is especially important, as these are the things that they tend to struggle with the most — communication, social interactions and emotions. For them, school readiness takes on added importance, though how they are prepared for school often differs from many of their peers.

What Skills Does ABA Therapy Help Build?

ABA therapy can often be very successful in helping children on the autism spectrum build the skills that they struggle with most, including communication and social interaction.

Through repetition, positive reinforcement, naturalistic learning and many other strategies, ABA therapists help their patients build the communications skills they often lack. This not only includes making connections between words and objects, and learning how to speak and express themselves, but also how to better identify, interpret and understand nonverbal cues such as body language, facial expressions and tone of voice.

Communication is the building block of social interaction, which is why those two skill sets are so interconnected. Through ABA therapy, children with autism can build communication skills, which can then help them become more comfortable in social settings and reduce any feelings of being overwhelmed, anxious or stressed they may experience.

What School Readiness Skills Can ABA Therapy Help With?

During the normal course of sessions, ABA therapists will be teaching children some of the basic skills that are necessary for school readiness.

This includes following instructions, paying attention, completing tasks and transitioning from tasks that the child prefers, such as playing, to those that they may not prefer, such as following an instruction.

All of this is integrated directly into the sessions, since a child must be able to pay attention and follow instructions if they are to build communication skills, for instance.

While many ABA therapy treatment plans are administered on a one-to-one basis, especially to start with, this can be expanded to include other peers at some point. What this does is help to teach children with ASD some of the other skills that are necessary for school readiness.

Some examples include responding to requests from peers, participating in various group activities, standing in a line with others, being aware of your personal space, and group play.

These are all skills that are essential for school readiness, as children will need to exhibit them to be successful in the classroom — and to not distract others as well.

This isn’t to say, of course, that children with autism will be expected to be completely independent when they enter school. By contrast, there are many children with ASD who require hands-on extra help when they enter school, and many of them may even require ABA therapy to be administered in school environments.

Regardless of what type of support they need when they enter a traditional classroom setting, ABA therapy can prove very successful for building some of the essential skills they’ll need to thrive.

Blue Gems ABA Helps Prepare Children with ASD for School

Preparing children with autism for school is one of the main goals of many ABA therapy treatment plans. Through many strategies, therapists can help children build the skills that they’ll need to excel.

At Blue Gems ABA, our team of experienced BCBAs are experienced in crafting ABA therapy goals that help their patients prepare for a school environment, setting them up for lifelong success.

To learn more, please contact us today.