How to Celebrate ABA Success with Your Child

Children often thrive on constant reinforcement and praise. Regardless of their developmental abilities, children are constantly seeking acceptance from their parents, caregivers and other adults, all of which tells them that they’re safe and supported, which encourages them to accomplish more.

Recognizing a child’s efforts in attempting something new, even if they weren’t “successful” in achieving what they set out to do, often encourages them to keep trying. For instance, when parents praise their young children for standing up for the first time, it encourages them to try it again, which serves as the building blocks for learning how to walk.

Children who have autism spectrum disorder (ASD) often thrive on this type of positive reinforcement, too, which is why that’s a central part of applied behavior analysis (ABA therapy).

ABA therapy is considered the gold standard treatment for children on the autism spectrum because of how effective it is in helping them improve social and communication skills, while modifying certain behaviors. It is rather intensive, though, and progress is typically more gradual than instant.

So, how can you celebrate ABA success with your child to keep them motivated enough to continue going? Here are some ideas on what you can do.

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Celebrate Even Small Milestones

ABA therapy is recognized for the amazing benefits it can provide children with autism. Major milestones could include learning to talk and communicate needs and wants effectively, feeling comfortable interacting with peers and participating in social interactions, and gaining independence to be able to do daily tasks and/or attend school.

All of these are great goals to set and work toward, but it’s important to celebrate the smaller milestones that they will accomplish along the way.

One of the main strategies of ABA therapy is to break down big goals into individual, smaller tasks that are more manageable. As such, it’s easy for therapists and parents to identify what some of the smaller milestones are, and then recognize and celebrate your child achieving them.

Give Positive Reinforcement

Another core strategy of ABA therapy is positive reinforcement. When children successfully complete requested tasks, for instance, therapists reward them based on what motivates them — by giving them extra praise or allowing them extra time with a toy they love, for instance.

Parents can do this, too, throughout their days to celebrate their child’s success. In order to do this, though, parents must be well-informed about everything their child is doing and accomplishing in therapy sessions.

It’s incumbent on the therapy team to establish a good rapport with family members so that this information can be communicated, and so that family members can play an active role in the child’s progress.

This can be done in a number of ways, from holding regular meetings with parents to sharing ongoing progress reports with them that highlight some of the key achievements and/or efforts their child has made in therapy. The information that’s shared with family members can then serve as the basis for how the family can display positive reinforcement to encourage their child to keep putting forth the effort.

Get the Whole Family Involved

ABA therapy success really does depend on family involvement. In this respect, we’re talking about involvement from the entire family, too.

Parents certainly wield a lot of influence over their children, but siblings learn immensely from each other and are extra motivated to do things when they’re siblings encourage them to do so. If you have multiple children, get them involved in celebrating your child with autism’s progress in ABA therapy.

Simply smiling, clapping and sharing affection in other ways can go a long way in making your child with ASD feel loved and appreciated, and proud of the work that they’ve done and the things they’ve accomplished.

You can celebrate your child’s ABA success with small acts of kindness and positive reinforcement, and also set up separate special family days to celebrate bigger successes.

Incorporating some of the strategies and skills learned in ABA therapy sessions in these family interactions can also help to reinforce the skills with your child, and teach others in your family what they are learning.

Blue Gems ABA Helps Children with ASD Achieve Major Milestones

Children with ASD can achieve major milestones and successes through ongoing ABA therapy. The ideas presented above are just a few of the ways in which you can encourage your child’s ongoing efforts and progress.

At Blue Gems ABA, we know how important celebrating ABA therapy success with our patients is, and we encourage family members to do the same. We work to establish good rapport with all of our patients’ family members, as we know how important that is to our patients’ ongoing growth and success.

To learn more, please contact us today.