I’d Like One Pie for Delivery

I was in the middle of nowhere in a southern town and wanted pizza. There was an ad in the hotel room, so I called the local place. When they answered, I said, “I’d like one pie for delivery.” He answered, “This is a pizza place. We don’t sell pie.” OK, in that case, I’ll have a pizza.

In New York City, it was common to use the phrase “pizza pie.” We thought it was hysterical that the guy working in the pizza place didn’t understand what I wanted. But why should he? He lives in the middle of nowhere. He probably got off the phone and said to his co-workers, “Can you believe some idiot just called up and tried to have us deliver a pie?” They probably thought it was hysterical.

When working with children with autism, miscommunication is common. One of the most important things we can do is provide crystal-clear communication to the child about what we are trying to teach. If you can do that, half the job of teaching is done.

Unfortunately, it is hard to be extremely clear in our communication. There are almost always multiple ways to interpret a lesson. This was our team’s major insight when we learned how to teach pronouns to children with autism. The standard procedures left a very important part of learning unclear. Specifically, the pronoun that should be used changes based on who is speaking. For example, if the child says, “I want a cookie,” he is referring to himself. When mom says, “Sure, you can have a cookie,” she is also referring to the child, but she uses a different pronoun. That’s awfully confusing. Our small contribution was simply a way to provide crystal-clear communication in that scenario.

If you look carefully, you will usually find that errors made by learners are completely logical from their point of view. Just like it was logical for the kid answering the phone not to understand that we call a “pizza” a “pie” in NY.

Behavior analytic services should only be delivered in the context of a professional relationship. Nothing written in this blog should be considered advice for any specific individual. The purpose of the blog is to share my experience, not to provide treatment. Please get advice from a professional before making changes to behavior analytic services being delivered. Nothing in this blog including comments or correspondence should be considered an agreement for Dr. Barry D. Morgenstern to provide services or establish a professional relationship outside of a formal agreement to do so. I attempt to write this blog in “plain English” and avoid technical jargon whenever possible. But all statements are meant to be consistent with behavior analytic literature, practice, and the professional code of ethics. If, for whatever reason, you think I’ve failed in the endeavor, let me know and I’ll consider your comments and make revisions, if appropriate. Feedback is always appreciated as I’m always trying to Poogi.

Time Loops

Probably my favorite genre of movies and television shows is time travel. I especially like stories with time loops. The best-known story in this genre is Groundhog Day, but there are many others. Recently, when I was sick for a few days, I binged-watched most of them. Time loops involve a person reliving the same day repeatedly. After each loop, they try something new and often improve their life in the process.

Of course, in real life, the same events do not repeat over and over again. Too many things change from day to day. On the other hand, things often don’t change that much. While there are many things in life that you can’t foresee, many things are very predictable.

In our work with children with autism, it can be helpful to think about time loops. We know that when our student hears the lawnmower, sees the iPad isn’t charged or that we ran out of mac and cheese, problem behavior is almost certainly going to occur. If you have been presenting the same lesson in the same way for ten days with no progress, day 11 is unlikely to be different.

If we were in a time loop movie, we certainly would have improved. If the child had a tantrum every day at 10 AM, we would do something different to stop that from occurring. If the child made the same errors during instruction, we would have likely tried a new procedure. Since our days are very varied, we often fail to see obvious patterns. Great BCBAs find patterns that aren’t obvious and more difficult to discover.

We tend to think that every day is completely different–the behavior seems to occur randomly. That is rarely the case. There is almost always a predictable pattern to discover. We aren’t in a time loop movie, but events repeat more than we realize.

 

Behavior analytic services should only be delivered in the context of a professional relationship. Nothing written in this blog should be considered advice for any specific individual. The purpose of the blog is to share my experience, not to provide treatment. Please get advice from a professional before making changes to behavior analytic services being delivered. Nothing in this blog including comments or correspondence should be considered an agreement for Dr. Barry D. Morgenstern to provide services or establish a professional relationship outside of a formal agreement to do so. I attempt to write this blog in “plain English” and avoid technical jargon whenever possible. But all statements are meant to be consistent with behavior analytic literature, practice, and the professional code of ethics. If, for whatever reason, you think I’ve failed in the endeavor, let me know and I’ll consider your comments and make revisions, if appropriate. Feedback is always appreciated as I’m always trying to Poogi.

Ideas

When Cheryl and I moved from Illinois to NY, we decided to donate, recycle, or throw away anything that we couldn’t fit in our two tiny Toyota Tercels. It is amazing how much stuff can accumulate in the two years we were getting master’s degrees. We got rid of a lot, but we still managed to fit a lot of stuff into our two tiny cars.

Now, many years later, we both have larger cars, but I doubt that even my collection of ideas to Poogi programs for children with autism would fit inside both of our cars. I have years and years of scribblings, notebooks, and random pieces of paper with ideas. That doesn’t include the ridiculous amount I have in digital files like Dropbox, emails, and flash drives.

The thing about my collection of ideas is that most of them are terrible and will never be effective. That’s OK. I’m a strong believer that the only way to get great ideas is to have a lot of ideas. Then, only implement the best ones.

I’d do one thing differently now.  Once I determine that my idea doesn’t work, I now document the results, and then destroy both the paperwork and electronic files as soon as possible.

Clutter is a big enemy of the POOGI.

 

Behavior analytic services should only be delivered in the context of a professional relationship. Nothing written in this blog should be considered advice for any specific individual. The purpose of the blog is to share my experience, not to provide treatment. Please get advice from a professional before making changes to behavior analytic services being delivered. Nothing in this blog including comments or correspondence should be considered an agreement for Dr. Barry D. Morgenstern to provide services or establish a professional relationship outside of a formal agreement to do so. I attempt to write this blog in “plain English” and avoid technical jargon whenever possible. But all statements are meant to be consistent with behavior analytic literature, practice, and the professional code of ethics. If, for whatever reason, you think I’ve failed in the endeavor, let me know and I’ll consider your comments and make revisions, if appropriate. Feedback is always appreciated as I’m always trying to POOGI.

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