Adrienne Beckham
Comprehensive Exam
Incidental Teaching
March 14th, 2015
Incidental Teaching
Siskin Early Development Center in Chattanooga, Tennessee uses the Engagement Classroom Model (ECM). During my observations, there were multiple teaching strategies used to promote a student’s development. Incidental Teaching was one of the teaching strategies used. This strategy embeds learning in play, routines, and interest areas rather than separating out learning time from everyday events and activities. An example of Incidental Teaching was when the teacher noticed the students found a spider on the playground and responded to the student’s interest of spiders by teaching about spiders. The students created a ‘spider web’ in the
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Incidental teaching has been proven to promote generalization at the same time as initial instruction (McGee, G., 2005). In other words, by teaching in the settings in which children will actually need to use the new skills, amid the ever-changing distractions that are normally present in the real world, children can learn new social skills that they are more likely to be able to use in a variety of situations (McGee, G., 2005). Incidental teaching is efficient, doesn’t promote cue dependency, adults can deliver instruction while taking care of other childcare activities, can be provided during normal early childhood activities, reduces behavioral challenges (McGee, G., …show more content…
Teaching within the context of typical activities typical activities have been found to promote generalization (McGee, Morrier, & Daly, 1999). Second, social initiations are an integral part of teaching. Third, the child directed approach and a natural reinforcement involved make learning meaningful and enjoyable, Fourth, it can easily incorporated into typical daily routines by teachers and parents. Finally, it provides data reflective of actual daily functioning which is essential for data based decision making.
References
Hart, B., & Risley, T. (1975). Incidental teaching of language in the preschool. Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis, 8(4), 411-420.
McGee, G. (2005). What's incidental about incidental teaching? The Best of Autism Digest Magazine, 157-163.
McGee, G. G., & Daily, T. (2007). Incidental teaching of age-appropriate social phrases to children with autism. Research and Practice for Persons with Severe Disabilities, 32, 112-123.
McGee, G. G., Morrier, M. J., & Daly, T. (1999). An incidental teaching approach to early intervention for toddlers with autism. The Journal of the Association for Persons with Severe Handicaps, 43, 133-146.
Valdez-Menchaca, M., & Whitehurst, G. (1988). The effects of incidental teaching on vocabulary acquisition by young children. Child Development, 59,
Incidental teaching focuses on child-initiated interactions. (Hall, 2013) Incidental teaching is used to increase skills of individuals with autism spectrum disorders. (Hall, 2013) A study done by Hart and Risley (1975) looked at the incidental teaching process used at the preschool age to aide in teaching language. Incidental teaching has been the most frequent strategy that has been used to teach language. When using incidental teaching a child’s request may be verbal or nonverbal. Examples include reaching for an object that is out of one’s reach, requesting food or a toy or calling an adult’s name. There is a series of decisions that an adult can use to respond to the child’s request. These choices include: if the occasion should be used for incidental teaching: if so then a choice regarding the language behavior that is obtained from the child, and then a choice has to be made concerning the cue that will be used to initiate instruction, the cur could be focus of attention by itself, or in addition to the focused attention a verbal cue as well. If the individual does not respond to the cue, then a choice concerning the degree of prompt to be used, the “fullest degree: a request for imitation; medium degree: a request for partial imitation, or minimal degree: a request for the terminal language behavior.” (Hart & Risley, 1975) This study was performed on boys and girls between the ages of four years old to five years old. The baseline procedures ensured that the children had a variety of vocabulary for use in sentences. The sentences that they were taught was “I want x so I can y.” The second step of the procedure was the use of incidental teaching of compound sentences directed to teachers. After thirty-six days of school, the incidental teaching began to occur when the children needed assistance in trying to get different preschool materials.
Engagement in classroom discussions influences positive engagement in the workplace by allowing the individual to be more social and attentive when put in the environment, and to also makes the environment a great place to work. The first thing everyone learns is listening and acknowledging what you have learned which is used in any setting. Classroom engagement can help develop someone’s communication skills, time management and self awareness. Being in the classroom teaches you how to communicate with people, and speak to people positively. This type of
“Your child has autism spectrum disorder” are words no parent wants to hear. They are words that will instill fear, worry, and sadness. When parents hear this for the first time, they will have many questions. “Is there anything I can do to help my child? If so, what can be done?” Early intervention services; such as applied behavior analysis therapy, occupational therapy, sensory integration therapy, and speech therapy before the age of three; can help improve the development of children with autism spectrum disorder. As an educator, early intervention is a subject teachers should be well educated in. It would be beneficial to the educator and the student, for a teacher to know and understand early intervention strategies.
Development of social skills is very important for children that are diagnosed with autism because of ...
Morrison, G. S. (1976). Chapter 6: Early Childhood Programs APPLYING THEORIES TO PRACTICE. In Early childhood education today (10th ed., pp. 5-31). Columbus, Ohio: Merrill.
Snell, M. E. (2003). Autism, Education of Individuals with. In J. W. Guthrie (Ed.), Encyclopedia of Education (2nd ed., Vol. 1, pp. 161-162). New York: Macmillan Reference USA.
Social interaction is considered a core deficit in children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Due to impairments in social interactions, children with ASD fail to develop peer relationships and share enjoyment and interests (Ashbaugh, Bradshaw, K.Koegel, & L. Koegel, 2014). Difficulty engaging with others may persist throughout the lifespan; therefore it is crucial to identify these underdeveloped social behaviors and to target early intervention. In regard to intervention strategies, Pivotal Response Treatment (PRT) has been proved to be an effective, efficacious and naturalistic intervention for communication and social functioning of children with ASD derived from applied behavioral analysis (ABA). An important component of PRT is motivational strategies which emphasizes natural reinforcement. Reinforcers that are logically related to the outcome of a behavior have been shown to be more effective than unrelated reinforcers in teaching tasks. For example, a child opening the lid of a container with an edible reinforcer inside (i.e. cookie) is more effective than a child opening the lid of a container then receiving an edible reinforcer after. By implementing PRT, children with autism will strengthen the response-reinforcer relationship thus encourages their social communication.
Luiselli, James K. "Verbal Language and Communication." Teaching and Behavior Support for Children and Adults with Autism Spectrum Disorder: A Practitioner's Guide. New York: Oxford UP, 2011. Print.
Soenksen and Alper, 2006 D. Soenksen, S. Alper Teaching a young child to appropriately gain attention of peers using a social story intervention Focus on Autism and Other Developmental Disabilities, 21 (1) (2006), pp. 36–44
Teachers must pay attention to presenting to their students, is very important in their education. If the student finds it too much of challenge there will give up and if it’s too easy there will be bored. An example of teaching strategies is scaffolding strategic support that teachers provide that allows children to complete a task they could not accomplish independently (Vygotsky, 1978; Wood, Bruner, & Ross, 1976). Teacher needs to plan out a task according to the child ability to help they respond and engaged the lesson there increase their independent performance in school. It creates an understanding of English is pronouncing and how to read, both of these skills are important in life. By making these an important part of early child development it reinforces these
Autism is a disease. One of the main characteristics is having social problems. Children with Autism have trouble interacting with other children. They won’t play with other children. They could be so focus...
Dempsey, I. & Foreman, P. ( 2001). A Review of Educational Approaches for Individuals with Autism. International Journal of Disability, Development and Education, 48 (1), 105-116.
These authentic learning activities are more engaging for the students and allow for a wide range of learning styles. It is imperative that all teachers attempt to integrate these experiences into their classroom as often as possible. These activities usually take more time and energy to plan and implement, but the benefit to the students make the extra work worthwhile.
Wolery, M., & Hemmeter, M. (2011). Classroom Instruction: Background, Assumptions, and Challenges. Journal Of Early Intervention, 33(4), 371-380. http://library.gcu.edu:2048/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=eric&AN=EJ952335&site=ehost-live&scope=site
Jordan, R., & Powell, S. (1995). Understanding and Teaching Children with Autism. New York: Wiley.