So many people have told me that they have loved reading my book.
They have read and reread it.
A student, a speech and language therapy student I recently met, told me she did a book report
on my book, The Verbal Behavior Approach, and she cited that she got two main lessons.
Today, I want to talk about those two lessons and tell you where you can go if you really
liked my book, and what you're going to like even more.
Hi.
I'm Dr. Mary Barbera, autism mom, board-certified behavior analyst, online course creator, and
the author of the bestselling book, The Verbal Behavior Approach.
As I said, I recently met a young student, a speech and language therapy student, who
read my book, and she did a book report and a presentation on my book.
She told me that she really loved the book and she got two main points out of the book
that she was able to apply right away to help her kids, some without autism.
I was really interested.
I said, "Let me know, tell me, which are the two points you pulled out from my book, because
I'd really be interested."
She said the first point was that if we see problem behaviors, the demands are too high,
and/or reinforcement is too low.
I stress this in my book and in all my online courses and work.
Basically, what I'm saying is that ... This isn't just kids with autism.
If I was a worker at Walmart and I was complaining, having some kind of problem behavior, I was
complaining about, the boxes are too heavy, I don't get any days off that I want, the
pay isn't very good, you know, I'm complaining, so I'm having problem behaviors.
What that's telling me is, my job at Walmart is either too hard and/or the reinforcement
isn't high enough.
The reinforcement's too low, the demands are too high.
So I'm complaining about the boxes being too heavy, the work's too hard.
I'm also complaining about the reinforcement.
The pay's not good, the time off isn't what I want.
My reinforcement is not great.
Same with kids with autism.
Kids with autism throw themselves on the ground because they don't want to put their coat
on, they don't want to take a bath, they don't want to do math homework, and/or they want
the cookie, they want the iPad, they want things.
So demands are too high, and/or reinforcement's too low.
And so what we do there, using my approach, which is the science of ABA with the verbal
behavior approach, is we flip it around initially, and we become the spoiling grandmother making
everything very easy, very reinforcing.
The demands go way down, reinforcement goes way up.
Then once we get the child in a really good state, we start shifting it ever so slightly
so that the reinforcement gets faded down and the demands start fading up.
Pretty much we're pairing these work activities with reinforcement to make it more work and
less reinforcement, but initially we might have to flip it.
The second big point she pulled out from the book, which she wrote about in her book report,
is that we all need eight positives to every negative.
Glenn Latham talked about this in his books, Positive Parenting and Behind the Schoolhouse
Door: Eight Skills Every Teacher Needs.
Glenn Latham had a PhD in special education.
Unfortunately, he died several years ago, but he was big on the fact that we all need
a lot more positives than negatives.
And kids with special needs, he showed, were getting a lot of negatives to very few positives.
When you have a kid who's having major problem behaviors, swinging from the chandeliers,
you know, just a really out-of-control child, what he noticed and what I have noticed as
I've looked at this is that they get a lot of negative comments.
Stop that, if I have to tell you one more time, knock it off, you're going to lose your
recess, you need to sit crisscross applesauce, don't lay down on the floor.
Whatever you're saying to the child, those are all in the negative pile.
Remember, Glenn Latham, and in my book I talk about eight positives to every negative.
So we want to flip that around.
We want to make tasks super easy so that we are able to give a lot of positive, specific
reinforcement and praise, and we want to get rid of all the hard stuff and get rid of the
negativity.
I really loved the fact that she was able to pull those two big thoughts from the book.
She was able to put that in her book report, and she was able to use that in the clinic
work that she was doing with kids with and without autism.
If you've never read the book or if you haven't read it in a while, you may want to read it
again.
But if you love my book, you will truly love my free online workshops, which you can sign
up for at marybarbera.com/workshop.
If you've picked out different things from my book or my courses that were ah-hah moments
for you, I'd love to hear them in the comments.
If you haven't listened to my new podcast yet, you also may want to check that out at
marybarbera.com/podcast.
I will see you here next week.