Services
“If they can’t learn the way we teach, we teach the way they learn”
- Dr. O. Ivar Loovas
Clinic Based ABA Therapy Services
At Learning Continuum, we offer several different ABA (applied behavior analysis) therapy techniques, and our therapy plans are tailored to meet your child’s specific goals. We are a clinic-based ABA center that offers both focused and comprehensive behavioral therapy treatment plans.
What is Behavioral Therapy?
“Behavior therapists frequently use ABA to treat individuals who learn and think differently, such as those who have been diagnosed with an autism spectrum disorder. Autism Speaks, a nonprofit that advocates for increased understanding and acceptance of people with autism, notes that positive reinforcement is a main strategy used in ABA.” (online.regiscollege.edu) ABA therapy uses positive reinforcement, such as a reward or positive affirmations, to encourage children to repeat the desired behavior. Studies have shown positivity produces better results than giving consequences or punishing a child for negative behaviors.
All of our programs are built around positivity. We want your children to build the confidence they need to keep making improvements. Our directors designed our behavioral therapy treatment programs to be flexible. This way, we can assess your child periodically and make adjustments to their plan as needed.
Learning Continuum is known for our flexible approach to treatment and scheduling. We always do our best to work with each family regarding their scheduling or familial needs.
Intake Assessment
After our initial intake assessment, one of our ABA therapists will recommend which of our programs will be best for your child. We use the VB-MAPP assessment to determine where your child is doing well and where they are struggling. This assessment will help us create the right program to meet your child’s goals.
Focused ABA Treatment Program
A focused program is for children who receive 10-20 hours of treatment per week. A child in the focused ABA therapy for autism program might attend school for the majority of the day and visit Learning Continuum to receive specific skills training after school. We offer skill training in many areas, including:
- Social skills
- Play skills
- Language/Communication skills
- Fine motor skills
- and more!
Comprehensive ABA Treatment Program
Our comprehensive ABA treatment program is for children receiving 20-40 hours per week of ABA treatment. The child will need to work with a therapist on several key areas of life. Examples include developing language and communication skills, independent living, social/play skills, and the reduction of interfering behaviors. Interfering behaviors are disruptive behaviors like screaming or aggression, and repetitive behaviors like repeating the same word or phrase over and over. We want your child to succeed, and helping them focus on minimizing interfering behaviors can produce amazing results.
Parent ABA Session
Learning Continuum believes a collaborative partnership with parents is the key to ABA treatment success in children. The ultimate goal of ABA therapy for autism is to teach the family the right tools to instruct and educate their child based on their child’s current learning patterns. We want to give your children the lifelong skill of learning, which requires practice and flexibility. We can discuss all this and more at our monthly parent ABA meetings.
Monthly parent ABA meetings will be scheduled at the parents’ convenience. These meetings will include reviewing your child’s progress in treatment and progress at home. We will also discuss the different barriers to success and provide strategies to assist you at home. If you have noticed any new problem behaviors between sessions, these parent meetings are the perfect place to bring them up. We can work with you to adjust your child’s treatment plan to accommodate new behaviors.
Parents are also permitted to observe their child from a private room during therapy sessions. Your ABA therapist will demonstrate different ABA therapy techniques and targets for you, and they will work with you to implement Discrete Trial Training (DTT) at home. DTT is breaking a skill down into smaller, simpler steps rather than teaching them everything at once.
If you have any questions or concerns during therapy sessions, please speak with your therapist to avoid further issues. We are here to help you and meet your needs.
School Consultation
Learning Continuum offers school consultations for both public and private schools. We conduct function-based assessments (FBA) and develop function-based behavior intervention plans (BIP) based on the assessments. After the BIP is developed, our team will provide in-person training to the school staff members on how to implement proactive (antecedent interventions) and reactive (consequence-based) strategies.
Proactive strategies include removing things from your child’s environment that may amplify negative behaviors or implementing a schedule or routine to give them some stability. Reactive strategies include positive reinforcement of desired behaviors and natural consequences for negative behaviors.
Learning Continuum also offers public and private school districts wide training on ABA approaches and techniques that teachers can use in their classrooms. Classroom ABA topics include:
- Utilizing reinforcement in the classroom
- Use of prompting and prompt fading techniques
- Managing interfering behaviors in a busy classroom
- Tracking data in a classroom setting
Implementing new ABA techniques can be challenging, but if parents and teachers are on the same page about using these strategies and take time to practice, children with autism and developmentally delayed children will start to show signs of progress.
Progress Review Meetings
At Learning Continuum, we understand you want to know how your child is progressing over time. We have several mechanisms in place which will allow you to receive daily, weekly, and monthly updates. We know communication is important and we love to share how your child is doing, after all…….we are proud of them too!
We schedule semi-weekly parent review sessions with you to discuss how your kiddo is doing within their current goals. We also demonstrate various skills and will guide you on how to implement the strategies at home. We believe in strong partnerships with our families and communication is the key to make those bonds strong.
In addition, we conduct child progress meeting with the Learning Continuum team to ensure we are consistent with our approach and to trouble shoot any areas of concern.
Our curriculum
Community Events and Field Trips
Some of our top priorities at Learning Continuum are to teach children with autism how to attend community events and tolerate social situations. Some children on the autistic spectrum have difficulties entering new or novel places due to the uncertainty around those situations. If they have never been somewhere, they may be nervous about the unknown. Some children need to know what to expect before they feel comfortable going somewhere new. Some examples include going to a doctor’s appointment, getting a haircut, shopping at the grocery store, and going to large, crowded events.
Also worth mentioning, the excess loud noise, bright lights, and amount of people can cause sensory overload. Some ASD children can become overstimulated quickly, which can result in a meltdown. Depending on the severity of the meltdown, you may end up leaving events earlier than you planned. This is when you need our services.
To address your concerns with family outings, a member of our staff will accompany you to these environments and model how to assist your child in coping with the new situation. We can teach you different ABA therapy techniques to help your child attend events.
We offer quarterly events on-site to shape each child’s experience and tolerance of social situations. For example, we have holiday parties each year and encourage the children’s parents and siblings to attend. We also invite our staff’s family members. The purpose of our holiday parties is to bring families together to build a supportive network, as well as teach children how to interact in social situations.
During our hours of operation, we offer larger event field trip opportunities. Some of the events we’ve attended with our ASD kids include the rodeo, indoor gaming businesses, trampoline parks, and concerts. Parents will transport their children to and from larger events. While we are at the event, our ABA staff will model specific ABA techniques so the parents can learn new strategies.
Key learning areas
- English
- Mathematics
- Science, Humanities and Social Sciences
- Music
- Visual Arts
- Health and Physical Education
Contact Us Today
If you are ready to get your child on the right path to progress, contact us today and set up an intake appointment. Learning Continuum is ready to help you and your child meet your goals.
