Education Friday - Part Three Martha Gabler

How I Taught My Nonverbal Child with Autism to Read

Hello. My name is Martha Gabler and I am the parent of a nonverbal teenage son with autism. 

When I reported to Spectrum Mom that my son can read, she asked me to describe how I taught him. 

Here is part three of my story:

Here are the three steps I used to teach my son to read: 

1. Make sure foundation skills are in place
2. Use Direct Instruction reading programs
3. Provide lots of supports, lots of opportunities to practice, and high levels of positive reinforcement.

Step Three: Provide supports, lots of opportunities to practice, and lots of high-value reinforcement

It is also very important to build a trusting relationship between the learner and the instructor. The child must have experience and confidence that he will only be asked to do tasks that he is capable of doing, and that he will only be asked to do tasks for the length of time he is comfortable performing them. The learner must be confident that the instructor will monitor the child’s emotional reactions and provide supports and respite as soon as he needs them. 

Also, the child needs high levels of reinforcement throughout the instructional sessions. Basically, the child needs to know that he will experience only success and reinforcement throughout the process; he should never experience failure, fatigue or frustration. It takes time and practice for the instructor and the learner to know how much they can 

do and when to stop.

So Where Are We Now?

I started teaching my nonverbal son with severe autism to read when he was 7. Now, at age 17 he can read fourth grade text at a fluency rate of 110 words per minute with no more than 0-2 errors. He easily decodes words like impression, binoculars, stationed and boasted. He is an excellent speller. He is completely comfortable with text and can work with charts, tables, diagrams and maps. Direct Instruction reading passages provide both fictional stories and academic content knowledge. As a result, he has learned a great deal about natural science, botany and animal behavior. When we go

out to parks he studies the signs and information panels 

along the hiking trails.

What about reading comprehension? Well, it is difficult to assess comprehension when the learner does not have the speech capacity to produce the answer to a question. In written comprehension questions he has made a lot of progress, especially when I see his eyes flash back and forth from the worksheet to the book to find the answer to a question. He does it with cool competence and joy. He works very hard at his reading, and his determination is touching to see.

Does he love reading? Yes. 

Is he proud of himself? Yes. 

Was it worth it? Yes. 

Letters, words, sentences and paragraphs are now part of my son’s world. Reading is natural for him. He will go through life with the ability to read. What was the most important thing? Direct Instruction, Direct Instruction, Direct Instruction.

Please feel free to contact me through my website below if you have any questions.

For more information about Direct Instruction, see below.

National Institute for Direct Instruction (NIFDI), www.nifdi.org

Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons, by Dr. Siegfried Engelmann

Direct Instruction Reading, by Douglas W. Carnine, Jerry Silvert, Edward J. Kameenui.

Educating Children with Learning and Behavior Problems, by Dr. Martin Kozloff.

Martha Gabler is the mother of a 17 year old nonverbal boy with severe autism. From her experience in working with her son she founded Kids’ Learning Workshop LLC, a tutoring center specializing in the use of Direct Instruction for learners with special needs. She is also the author of Chaos to Calm: Discovering Solutions to the Everyday Problems of Living with Autism; this book describes how to use positive reinforcement along with an event marker signal to increase functional behaviors in a child with autism. See www.autismchaostocalm.com.

Education Friday - Gabler Part Two

How I Taught My Nonverbal Child with Autism to Read

Hello. My name is Martha Gabler and I am the parent of a nonverbal teenage son with autism. When I reported to Spectrum Mom that my son can read, she asked me to describe how I taught him. 

Here is part two of my story:

Here are the three steps I used to teach my son to read: 

1. Make sure foundation skills are in place
2. Use Direct Instruction reading programs
3. Provide lots of supports, lots of opportunities to practice, and high levels of positive reinforcement.

Step Two: Use Direct Instruction Reading Programs

Many people are unfamiliar with the fact that there are scientific, research-validated methods for teaching academic skills. The most powerful and effective of these is a body of instructional programs known as “Direct Instruction.” 
These programs are based on both scientific principles of human learning and scientific principles of how to best teach specific academic skills. Direct Instruction (DI) curricula in reading, arithmetic, writing, spelling and language have a 40+ year record of delivering superior learning outcomes in all types of learners.

The specific program that I started with is a book by the founder of Direct Instruction, Dr. Siegfried Engelmann, entitled Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons. This book is widely available at bookstores and on the internet and costs about $25. By the time we were on Lesson 17, my son was reading. We eventually moved on to the well-known Direct Instruction Reading Mastery series.

Keep in mind, however, that DI programs are designed for typically developing children who have speech. When you are working with a child with special needs, you have to approach things differently. It is very important to know your learner well and adapt the presentation so that your learner has success. Please note, I never made changes to the DI presentation itself. Primarily I provided extra supports, extra modeling, more repetition, or extra practice on certain parts of each lesson. Extra supports should be determined by the child’s level of performance.

Part Three of this essay will run next Friday, December 20.

Martha Gabler is the mother of a 17 year old nonverbal boy with severe autism. From her experience in working with her son she founded Kids’ Learning Workshop LLC, a tutoring center specializing in the use of Direct Instruction for learners with special needs. She is also the author of Chaos to Calm: Discovering Solutions to the Everyday Problems of Living with Autism; this book describes how to use positive reinforcement along with an event marker signal to increase functional behaviors in a child with autism. See www.autismchaostocalm.com.

Education Friday-Dena Gassner, guest expert

Today I'm featuring Dena Gassner in conversation with a great parent of a wonderful kid
with autism. Understanding how
your child remembers may determine best practices in teaching your child.*
Because this was originally a web posted conversation, I've added some clarification.


PARENT
I was talking with his resource teacher and his EA (he has had the same EA for 2 years) 
and my son is just a slow learner. He does really good at sounding out the sounds and know 
all his letters and the sounds they make. He has a hard time recalling the info he has in his
 little brain. He will know the word and then it's like he has never seen it before. Then we will 
be driving around town and he knows the name of his favorite restuarants or stores. Those he 
can read over and over again with no problem! So frustrating!!!! He is a very smart little guy 
and has so much potential. I also know how important the building blocks are in 1st grade. 
They say 2nd grade pretty much goes over everything you learned in 1st. 


DENA GASSNER
I think working on working memory is the first step. He seems unable to hold the 
cluster of words together long enough to retain it. But when it is in context (restaurant sign) 
he can match the pieces together. Like when you see your doctor out of scrubs...but the opposite.**
** [You don't know who your doctor is out of context. The boy has the opposite problem. 
He knows the letters and the sounds, but he doesn't know them in the new context of a word]


Dena L. Gassner, LMSW, is the director of The Center for Understanding
The Center for Understanding seeks to reduce the disenfranchisement of individuals and families 
who experience the world with autism spectrum differences through individually designed advocacy, 
systems navigation support, training,support groups and holistic empowerment.
*My boy used the Lindamood Bell Visualizing and Verbalizing system at school to help with visual memory. 
See past posts. 

Sight Unknown

My youngest has neurotypicism and is educating me about
his brother's strengths. Who knew that not every kid just
started reading books by Christmas in Kindergarten?
(yeah, I know, everybody but me)
So I bought sight word flash cards last Friday. He hated
them, but he liked a game they suggested-bean bagging
words. I spread out a grid of some he knew and some
he did not and the goal was to toss a bean bag on one
he could read and keep that card until he had five.
He did, and then we did five more and five after that.
Now this would not work with all kids with autism. I'm
not sure his brother would have been at all interested in
dropping bean bags on cards and he certainly couldn't
aim. But this game or some variation is worth a try if your
kid is struggling to read those first words. 
The trick, as always, is to give your child success.
If your kid knows one word, make winning one card the
goal, but keep the spread and take turns so you can
read out other words.

-Spectrum Mom


p.s.  I just saw that someone got to this site through searching for "what's the shrink ray
on the magic school bus called?" Very cute, and yet if the kid who wants to know has autism, 
this may be an important search. I think it's called the shrinkanator. Or is that on Phineas
and Ferb?

We Both Read

Way back when (an eyeblink ago)
when my nine year old
was four I looked for good books
to read with him and found the
We Both Read series.

The psychologist had said
he'd be reading at age three.
That didn't happen, but
he was a bit ahead
of the curve.

The We Both Read
series starts at a K level
and goes up. Titles include
simple stories and non-fiction
about bugs and and stars.



My boy liked the
You Read to Me, I'll Read to You

series more later, in

1st grade and still reads those

books to himself sometimes. 

They have more words

per page and sidebar pictures 

instead of full page illustrations.

I didn't think about that

at the time, but looking

back I think that's part

of the reason my kid

liked the We Both Read

series more initially.

I wish I could make

the world more easily

understandable for all

our kids. But finding the 

right books is a start.

-Spectum Mom