The difficulties I encounter while trying to explain past problems and successes in Robert’s education stem from the facts that they happened many years ago. The time, obviously, tainted my memory. Moreover, the effects of particular methods and attitudes on Robert’s development seemed to fluctuate over time.
It was hard to assess, at a given point in time, what helped, what was neutral, and what, sadly, slowed or even hampered Robert’s growth. Often, the LATER-SEEN EFFECTS forced me to asses the varied educational methods and attitudes in a new light.
I purposefully used terms “methods and attitudes” as I had found out long ago that “attitudes” were as important as “methods” in affecting Robert’s development.
Robert’s teachers/therapists were as baffled as I was by the fact that Robert was unable to point to even one correct picture when asked by his therapists to do so, but he was successfully pointing to almost 50 pictures when demand was given by a computer voice from the program First Words. I quickly came up with the explanation. I argued that Robert’s hearing was so sharp that for him even slight differences in the therapist’s utterances sounded completely different, while the computer voice was always the same.
It took me a few more months to realized how wrong I was. After I found out using the Shaffer set of picture cards that Robert has receptive knowledge of more than 50 words, I visited the program to ask to check if I was right. Two therapists confirmed that Robert pointed correctly to many words.
Unfortunately, they still didn’t seem completely convinced, and one of the therapists said: “To make sure that that HE REALLY KNOWS the words, we will practice with him just three words: ‘table, chair, and bed.'” And so they did practice. Every day a few sessions of 10 questions in a row, asking for one of those three words. Robert had to point to one of the two out of three. It was always one of the same three pictures. If he answered correctly he was given a piece of cracker or a candy and then asked again and again and again.
A few months passed, now at home Robert could point correctly to over 100 pictures (From Shaffer, sets 1 and 2) but he hesitated and was wrong while asked about….
You guessed it. “Bed, Table, or Chair.”
So it was not Robert’s hypersensitivity to vocal utterances that stopped him from learning from his therapists, but it was the difference in methods. The computer program was giving Robert pairs (maybe later three pictures even, I don’t remember it too well) chosen from 50 words. When Robert answered correctly, the other pair was presented. When he was wrong, the computer gave him the correct answer and went on.
Of course, I was mad that so much time was wasted impeding learning but I understood that everybody, including therapists, was learning as well. Still, I wish there were some scientific minds analyzing the way Robert was learning or not learning. Maybe then many errors in educating Robert could be avoided.
As for the attitudes.
As he started the ABA program, Robert had two therapists working with him. One was very well-trained. Yet it was the new, not so well-trained therapist who helped Robert make the first breakthrough with a processing a couple of first receptive labels uttered by a human, not a computer.
Both therapists kept rewarding Robert with proper reinforcers; be it pieces of chips or the words “great job.” But a new therapist was so happy every time Robert answered properly and so disappointed when he was wrong that her feelings affected Robert. He read her feelings and learned from them more than from the used and overused reinforcers.
