Advocating for children with autism is sometimes a rough road for parents and professionals.
So today I'm going to give you five steps both parents and professionals can take to
advocate more effectively for kids with autism.
Hi, I'm doctor Mary Barbera, autism mom, board certified behavior analyst, online course
creator, and the bestselling author of The Verbal Behavior Approach.
Each week I provide you with some of my ideas about turning autism around.
So if you haven't subscribed to my youtube channel, you can do that now.
So advocating is tough and I've had both parents and professionals really go and advocate very
hard for insurance reform.
I know that I had Dr. Amanda Kelly known as Behavior Babe on a podcast on episode number
eight talking about her advocacy efforts.
Um, I've talked to on a podcast, episode number three, I've talked to Kelsey, who's a single
mom of two who's taken all my courses and she's our online community manager.
She's had to advocate very hard and continues to have to advocate very hard for her kids.
I've had to advocate very hard for Lucas over the years.
I've learned a lot from that, those advocacy efforts.
I think within my course and community, especially the community that includes about half professionals
and half parents, we do talk a lot about how to advocate and um, when to push, when to
push harder, when to push less to get each child to reach their fullest potential.
So I want to give you five basic steps today.
You can, um, listen to a full podcast on advocacy.
Episode Number 19 is the podcast.
So, but I'm going to give you these five general tips or steps you can take whether you’re
a parent or professional.
So when we talk about advocacy, we really, a lot of times we'll go into that fight mode
while we're fighting for, and we really have to get out of that fight mode.
Everybody is well meaning everybody would like to have your child reach his fullest
potential.
It's just that there's a lot of things that might get in the way.
So when you think about advocacy, don't think about fighting.
Think about, um, promoting the, the goals of the child, the goals of the family based
on their assessment.
The first step is just not to get into fight mode.
And to really try to stay positive and supportive and calm and um, be assertive but not aggressive.
So number one is advocacy, not fighting.
Number two is you always want to start with an assessment.
I have a free one page assessment that's part of um, a guide that I wrote a year or so ago.
And that one page assessment can help you whether you have a two year old or a 20 year
old, just really get the basics down.
So you want to look for that link in the description below.
So always start with an assessment.
That one page quick assessment is not going to be enough.
You're going to need more assessments, but that might help you get started with just
taking a look at the whole picture quickly.
The third step after not a fighting and starting with assessment, we want to make sure the
plan and the goals and the placement are based on the child's assessment, not based on what's
available, financial implications and all that stuff.
So we really do want to make sure the plan and the goals.
I just looked at a VB MAPP recently.
The VB MAPP was done and it, it seemed okay and then the goals were not really intertwined
with the assessment.
The goals look like more traditional ABA approach versus the VB MAPP assessment.
So make sure that the assessment you're using is tied in with the goals and also tied in
with the family values and make sure it's appropriate for the child's age.
But we want to make sure that that plan is really based on the child's assessment.
The fourth step is to pair yourself with each other, whether if you're a parent, pair yourself
with the professionals.
If you're a professional, pair yourself with the parents.
We all need eight positives to every negative and um, we don't want to just keep hammering
more demands, more demands.
Um, if I am trying to advocate for Lucas and all they hear is, well this isn't going well
and that's not right and he needs more and, and blah, blah, blah, without any positives,
they are going to start, the professionals in his life are going to start to resent me
for putting so many demands on they're trying their best.
So try to step back and try to take a look at the other person's perspective and all
the variables at play and really try to give as many positives as you can.
And the fifth step is if there is disagreement, which there probably will be instead of just
fighting, well I think he should do this and I think he should do that.
And, and I don't think this is a good goal.
Go back to the assessment, look at the forest, not the trees.
And in some cases you might even need an independent evaluation or someone outside that can come
in and kind of mediate the situation and see, um, where the disagreement lies and how you
might be able to help get back on track.
So those are five steps you can take, um, to listen to a podcast on advocacy.
You can go to Mary barbera.com forward slash 19 and if you are considering joining my online
course and community, I would love to have you.
You can sign up or learn more about my course and community by going to a free workshop
at marybarbera.com forward slash workshop.
I hope that these five steps have helped you see how you might be able to better advocate
for your clients or children and I hope to see you right here next week.