How many years of ABA - is it for a lifetime?

[deadwitchproject]

I have read online that in the US, intensive early intervention is from around age 2 to 5. After age 5 it is not as intensive and then gradually drops off in school as the child should have learned the required skills (please someone correct me if this is wrong).

Is this how ABA works in the UK too? If your dc doesn't gain enough skills does this mean you have to do it for longer or would it no longer be as effective?

I am very seriously considering ABA for my DS and would like to get my head around just what it is likely to entail and for how long.

I think it depends on the child. I know some HF children who were on intense programmea for a few yeara only and I know also children (teens) with severe autism who have been on intense programmes since 4/5 and are still at 15/16.

It depends on dcs but there is an assumption that it is useful to go from "emerging verbal" to "verbal", and that it then drops off in intensity.

There is also an assumption among one or two LAs that parents get addicted to it and need persuading to let it go in favour of traditional class based learning.

I am afraid that is about the extent of my ABA knowledge. BUT these assumptions should be checked against the individual. I heard of one 11 year old who is still non-verbal and is essentially being offered ABA now for the first time seeing as nothing else has worked yet.

At ds1's ABA school there is no drop off in intensity if a child is (or becomes) verbal. There is still a huge amount to do from that point, in order to teach the basics of requesting, all the way up to conversation.

A child would have to have a pretty high IQ and learn incredibly quickly to not need ABA after the age of 5. ABA teaches so many skills, including social skills and self help...everything you can imagine really...so there is a lot of work to do to considering the rate at which neurotypical children learn.

It is TEACCH, the standard methodology used to teach children with autism in this country, which is designed to be a 'cradle to grave' system. ABA really has the opposite intention, of equipping the child with the skills to enable them to live and function happily in the outside world.

Most children do come off intensive home programmes at school age but again, most will continue Aba in some form, whether it is at an ABA school or at mainstream. It was never designed as a methodology only for small children. EIBI is a particular set up for pre school children.

Check out the ABA4ALL Facebook page if you can. Very informative.

I was born in the USA, but came to the UK when I was 7. So I can't really comment on the intensive interventions in America as I knew nothing about SEN back then.

Posted too soon!

Don't know a lot about ABA to give informative advice on. But I do know of a severely autistic child that started an ABA programme at the age of 4 then went to an ABA school when he was 6. His now 16, still at the school and is still non- verbal. But ABA has given him so many skills and has progressed so much.

There's was another high functioning child who was having ABA part time, whilst going to a speech and language unit. ABA helped him loads and there was a vast improvement, but his parents are going to continue with ABA.

It's hard to say whether ABA should be used on a child long term as every child with autism is different.

I use a mixture of strategies, a bit of ABA, Hanen, speech therapy and it seems to be working well with DS.

I strongly recommend you go on this site: www.teachmetotalk.com, to give you loads of ideas on what you can do with your DS.

Good luck,

My very delayed daughter needs ABA support 100% in school. She is 5. She needs more work 1-1 to teach any new academics

Thanks everyone. As I suspected, only a very few will need ABA for a short period of time. Most of our children will probably need it for a much longer time.

My dd1 is 10.

She has had ABA in some form or other (first a home programme, although not intensive - was part time - and then ABA school from age 5) since she was 3.

She has just had her secondary transition review, and will be staying at her ABA school for secondary, until 16 at the least. Her programme has changed a lot over the years, as her skills have increased, but there is still more than enough for her to learn, and she still needs the style/delivery.

I think it probably varies massively depending on the child.

We did a year of intensive ABA with ds before he started school. For the first two-ish years at (mainstream) school he had some ABA support at school, and some home sessions, but it wasn't intensive. Now he's 7yo, we still have one short session at home a week, and our tutor goes to school once a week to do group sessions. Now it's mainly about keeping an eye on any difficulties with social interactions, and practising scenarios that might help with that.