Adaptive Skills

Factors that Impact Acquisition of Skills:

• Motor skill challenges

• Sensory issues

• Attentional deficits

• Absence of prerequisite skills

• Lack of experience

• Interfering behaviors

• Lack of motivation and/or understanding of social motivation

• Parents/Caregiver underestimating abilities

• Parents/Caregiver being overprotective

• Parents/Caregiver doing everything because it’s easier or faster

Methods to Help Teach ADL & IADL:

• Forward Chaining - The child completes the steps in sequential order one at a time until they have mastered the skill.

• Total Task Chaining - The child is taught the sequence of steps every time the task is worked on.

• Backward Chaining - The caregiver completes all the steps except for the last one; the child completes the last step. Once the child has mastered the last step they move to the second to last step and so on.

• Chunking - The caregiver breaks up large amounts of information into small units. This strategy helps the child commit information to their long-term memory. (Simply breaking down large tasks into small manageable tasks).

Prompt Strategies:

• Physical Prompts - Physically guiding the child through the steps.

• Modeling - The caregiver models the steps.

• Gesture Prompts - The caregiver gives point or other gesture cues to the child while completing the steps.

• Verbal - The caregiver provides verbal cues to the child as they complete the steps.

• Visuals - Using visuals whether pictures and/or words can be a helpful tool in helping a child master routines.

• Sometimes a combination of these is needed.

*Always remember to use the least restrictive prompts needed and remove them as soon as possible.