How to Teach Intraverbal Behavior to Autistic Children
Through the development of intraverbal communication skills, children who suffer from autism can learn to better receive and respond to oral commands. Many children with this disorder struggle with intraverbal communication, or the process of receiving verbal commands and responding to them orally. Working to overcome this deficiency is vital to proper communicative development and, therefore, worthy of time and effort.
Instructions
-
-
1
Assess the child's current intraverbal communication skills. Ask the child simple questions and determine how effectively he can respond to them. If the child responds to each question with a statement that is on-topic and makes sense, he likely has relatively well-developed skills and may not require as serious an intervention as a child who is incapable of doing this.
-
2
Require the child to use his words when making requests. If the child attempts to make a request by motioning, say to him, "Use your words," and do not give him what he is requesting until he does so.
-
-
3
Complete fill-in-the-blank practices. Create question-response pairs with blanks, and ask the child to fill them in. For example, you could write, "Question: What do you want to eat? Answer: I want _______ for dinner." After the child has filled in the blanks, read them aloud, with you reading the questions and the child reading the newly-completed answers.
-
4
Create a categorization activity for the child. By studying the interrelationships of words, you can make intraverbal communication easier for the child. Write out words on index cards that fit into an assortment of categories. Label bags with these categories, and ask the child to sort the cards appropriately. For example, you could place the words "banana," "kiwi," "carrot" and "potato" on cards and ask the child to place them in one of two bags, one reading "fruits" and the other "vegetables."
-
5
Question the child daily to reinforce skills. Require verbal responses to easy questions such as, "What is your favorite color?" and "What street do you live on?"
-
6
Increase the expected complexity of the responses gradually. As the child becomes skilled at providing single-word answers, pose harder questions that require explanation, such as, "What do you like to do after school?"
-
1
