ABArrrrrgh! Shocked at cost - help!

[WorrierPrincess]

Well if I wasn't pissed off enough about DS having asd, I'm now seriously fuming about the cost of therapy.

I've been looking into setting up an ABA programme via consultants, and have been astonished to learn the initial cost of assessment and training is spiralling into thousands of pounds. WTF?

Part of me feels so overwhelmed by having a DS I so desperatly want to help that it's tempting to say "oh just take the money and fix our son!!"'(yes I know, it's not a cure).

But seriously... thousands just to set up some unregulated, unaccountable programme? Needless to say DH's reaction was: forget the ABA altogether and pin our hopes on the LA's preschool nursery for ASD kids (DS might get five sessions a week from September in a small group, using TEACH of course)

Well that's filled me with despair. From what I can see, the LA's help might stop him falling further behind his peers but it's hardly going to help him catch up.

So is there a halfway house? Naively I thought we could just take on somebody already experienced in ABA to work with DS two days a week, and also train us so we can make it part of our parenting. I was expecting to have to pay somebody experienced a reasonable rate but upwards of £100/hr....

Do you need a "case manager"? A "supervisor"? All this effin paperwork? I want to help DS, not run some sodding bureau.

Heeeeelllllppp! (please) x

It's like reading. You can read anything once you have the skill of READING.

You can't say that you cannot recommend reading unless you specify what exact genre you read yourself. The skill is READING.

It's like reading. You can read anything once you have the skill of READING.
Wrong you are forgetting comprehension. You have to be able to understand the vocabulary of the author.
The skill of reading is decoding and recoding the graphic symbols that represent the sounds of speech, comprehension of the meaning is another issue. The graphic symbols are chosen by each society, and there are different orthographies in each langauge and even local and regional variations.

Not a good comparison

But even teachers havfe to be trained to use the various programs to teach reading, and all teachers need to be able to use all the various teaching methodologies to be able to teach all the children in their classrooms. So they need to learn to teach to each childs cognitive learning needs, some need phonics, some need whole word, and some need a kinaesthetic approach, there is no single one size fits all, and that is before you start with the different writing systems.

So you will have to go back to basics and identify which of the various ABA systems you have been using, to help your children, and not talking in nonsense abstract terms.

I don't have to do anything *Dolfrog and you know as well as I do that I meant reading in it's full sense, not in it's decoding sense.

And you know also that I was talking about reading as a skill NOT teaching to read, which is something else entirely.

There is no such thing as an ABA system, only ABA methodology, of which there is one.

StarlightDicKenzie

reading is only about decoding the graphic symbols used by others, and if the author does not send a message you can decode and understand then you are not able to successfully read it. So as in hyperlexia the individual can read the words aloud but has no idea of the meaning of the word they have read. So comprehesion is different from decoding, so you need to go back and work out which types of ABA you have been using and the benefits each type has provided.
going back to reading those who can not use phonics to learn to read, are also not able to decode or pronounce, say new words unless they can imitate someone else who can use phonics say the new word. So the type of or subtype of the methodology is important, as we are all different.

So as an example if i want to hire a tutor to help my children to read, If they could only use phonics they would automatically be rejected. If they could use a whole word methodology to teaching reading then they would be considered for the job. Both phonics and whole word are methods of teaching reading, but those who have my disability can only use one. And there are various issues and severeties of issues that can make up the problems of ASD so you need to be more specific about what you are describing , as what best suites members of your ASD family may not best suite members of other ASD families. So you need to stop being so vague, and help others make better informed decisions, and not wasted their hard earned money on something which may/does not work for their children.

I have just spat my fruit salad all over my springcleaned office.
Bugger.

Dolfrog, God bless you my man.
I can't be unkind our ill mannered to you because I know you have suffered and for that I am very sorry.

I am utterly staggered by your paranoia and perverse logic.

I shall of course be reporting this conversation back to the evil people at ABA International Industry Inc. as they shovel money into wheelbarrows and chuckle.

In the meantime, here in one of the minor branches of the ABA Industry, I'll be getting on with making the kids' packed lunches and ironing my laundry. Then it'll be off to bed with my grand pan for world domination Observer.

PipinJo

clinically diagnosed as not possible, You really do need to understand the neurology, and cognitive barriers. You seem to lack an understanding of Auditory Processing Disorder. Which why I shudder at the marketing hype, faud that comes as part of ABA on this and other forums.

I think possibly Dolfrog you are just intimidated by ABA.

My DS has been dx with something, the severity of which has led to a common assumption that he has all kinds of memory, word-finding and understanding problems that after a pretty ad hoc rough and ready ABA programme he just doesn't have.

Incidentally, by 'program' in this instance, I mean a DS specific one written and devised by me. I haven't given it a name, nor published it. It was based on an assessment of ds' most pressing needs identified by independent standardised assessments.

moondog

"ABA International Industry Inc. as they shovel money into wheelbarrows and chuckle."

like with the dyslexia industry some of those wheelbarrows end up a universities short of funds, to carry out favourable research. Which is how many in the USA operated especially in the 1990s. And some used the universities legal faculty to slap outrages writs preventing other researchers disproving or questioning their findings. some universities owe their new facilities and even their existence to such practices. So not so much "paranoia" more discovering the fraudulent practicies on the world of remedial program provision and research, and how it can damage those it is supposed to help and support. All down to selling remedial programs and money.

I wish there was an ABA industry.
If there had been I might have received a percentage for every favourable post I have made about ABA over the last 5 or 6 years.

I feel very sorry for you, Dolfrog.

StarlightDicKenzie

I am not intimidated by ABA, I just want an honest discussion about the various programs and methodologies that have grown out of ABA. To discuss their strengths and limitations.
ABA can never repair a cognitive disability, but it may help provide an alternative compensating ability to work around a cognitive barrier, as happens with The Picture Exchange Communication System (PECS)

So I think it is you who are frightened to discuss the various types of program that have ABA roots because you have no real understanding of how it works, and not able to provide research based support for your claims.

So stop all the marketing hype and start talking about the specific forms of ABA provision you use, and which of the ABA based programs you would recommend to others for specific issues, otherwise your ABA advocacy is a fraud. You need ti explain HOW it works for each individual, and how it could work for others as in a Randomised Control Trial, which is the only way to demonstrate that any of this could provide any help for anyone.

Personally I think the ABA industry is in cahoots with the breastfeeding industry. I've always suspected that Breastfeeding advocates get huge bonuses whenever a mother feeds her child for free, and I'm highly suspicious of the funding source of research that suggests it might also be relatively healthy for the baby........

Dolfrog, no-one can discuss something with you that only you perceive to exist.

moondog

"I wish there was an ABA industry.
If there had been I might have received a percentage for every favourable post I have made about ABA over the last 5 or 6 years.

I feel very sorry for you, Dolfrog."

The problem you have is a lack of supportive research. Well research not funded by the USA organisation that sponsors the research you love to use.

So I think you are the one who needs the sympathy. Like any industry there does not need to be much co-ordination, but like say a blacksmith, each one is part of the same trade or industry, and benefits from any form of good publicity produced by others, especially those academics who also benefit from the same publicity.
Unfortunately you will probably not benefit financially from your ABA advocacy, but there are others the ABA providers who will generate income thanks to your comments. And it is those ABA providers and the universities that allow this a type of dubious research to be carried out, and even provide some equally dubious qualifications.

You really need to go back to international research, and stop playing lets insult the opposition.

There are no 'forms' of ABA in the way you describe. There is only ABA methodology.

There are 'some' curriculums which aim to make it easy for people with limited understanding of the methodology to learn and deliver ABA techniques.

There are some published resources for the learning of the more common skills such as pictures or puppets, but these are not ABA. They are tools in the way that a book isn't reading. Reading is reading. A book is just a book.

You can discuss how helpful you found the book, puppets, pictures etc and some resources might help you become more efficient in delivering the ABA, but they don't change the ABA.

Dolfrog, the Cambridge research website that you used to love linking to, holds up EIBI as the intervention most supported by research.

You've stopped posting that link since it was pointed out that EIBI IS ABA.

StarlightDicKenzie
"Dolfrog, no-one can discuss something with you that only you perceive to exist."

so what is it that i only percieve to exist.

StarlightDicKenzie
You mihgt like to have a look at my Diigo ASD links list where I keep all of my online ASD links.
My Links List: Autism ASD
if you can tell me which research paper you are referring to i would be greatful, or it could be included in the CiteULike Autism research paper collection.
I am not anti early intervention for those who have an ASD diagnosis, but there are others who need to full develop their cognitive abilities prior to any intervention, until the age of maturation 6-7 years of age when children stop growing out of developmental issues. So you have to be careful about who needs early intervention. The other issue in the UK is formal education starting at 7 years of age, when the age of maturation is reached as happens in other leading countries.