By Jaime Wedel, M.Ed., CAGS, BCBA

I actually LOVE that one of our most frequently asked questions is, “What do I do when my learner gets TOO good at using PECS® (or speech, or a Speech Generating Device (SGD), or sign-language) and makes requests that I can’t honor as a teacher or caregiver?” If you have this problem, CONGRATULATIONS! What a great indicator of an individual’s success learning to functionally communicate! Young boy looking at a communication book

This article will outline specific strategies for teaching our learners to tolerate when items or activities are unavailable. When beginning to teach communication skills, it is important to remember that we reinforce all, or as many requests as are reasonably possible, to help establish ourselves as “sources of good things”. In Phase I of PECS for example, we are setting up opportunities, so we should logically be able to honor requests. As we give our students what they ask for, we think of the analogy of making deposits in a bank. When we are not able to honor requests, or delay too long, we are making withdrawals. We want to maintain a “positive account balance” at all times with our students! (See page 104 in the PECS Training Manual, Second Edition for more information).

In Phase II of PECS and beyond, we are using unstructured opportunities across the day, and so might not have a requested item available. In general though, at Phase II, we still recommend leaving the single picture of the item on the cover of the Communication Book of what the learner is most likely to want in a given setting. We should also be as flexible as possible if, after an exchange, they want something other than what is pictured. Remember, at Phase II, PECS learners do not necessarily know what pictures represent, so we want to simply honor communication. Past Phase IIIB, our learners understand how to access different items using different pictures. Even though we may, for example, set up an opportunity for a student to ask for art supplies with those pictures on the cover of the Communication Book, the student might go inside their Communication Book and exchange a picture of a tablet! Because we had many successful Correspondence Checks™, we know our learner really does want to play on the tablet, not paint!

Again, think of the bank. If this is one of the first times your learner has done this, it would be absolutely ideal if a tablet could be quickly produced. Sometimes though, that is not possible. Or, your learner has clearly mastered asking for highly preferred items across settings and communication partners, and now you need to limit choices, so we are in a position of needing to say, “No.”

Here are some ideas to help your learner more easily accept the answer “No”

Take advantage of existing cues: a drink is empty, a snack is gone, a battery is dead, a toy is broken or lost, the remote won’t work, or similar. We don’t hesitate to create a cue when needed! For example, I only give learners the amount of a snack that would be reasonable for them to eat in a bowl or baggie. When they ask for the snack, I show them that it’s all gone! They don’t need to know there is more of that same snack hidden in the cupboard. We have removed batteries, switched a toy “off” (if the learner is unaware of the switch), changed passcodes and created similar cues.

Change the focus to what IS available. In the example above, if a learner asked me for a tablet that I could not give them in art, I might put pictures on the cover of the Communication Book of things I could give them if asked, such as paint, clay, or maybe even bubbles!

Use Critical Communication Skills

  • Often when we say, “No” what we really mean is “Wait.” A learner may not be able to have the swing now because another student is using it, but if they wait their turn, they can absolutely swing. We believe all learners should be taught how to wait via a structured lesson. Once the learner knows the wait lesson, it’s just a matter of us communicating more clearly and saying, “Wait for the swing” vs. “No swing.”
  • If the learner is independently using a visual schedule, we can use the schedule as a teaching tool. Remember, we would not expect a learner to understand pictures of things like “Gym vs. Literacy” on a visual schedule if they have not mastered Phase IIIB picture discrimination skills. For example, if a learner asked for a puzzle during morning circle. In that case, I took the student to the schedule, and showed them, “Now we are in circle, but next we will be in free-play and you can choose puzzles.”
  • Use a visual reinforcement system, such as Working 4, Visual Reinforcement Cards or Earn-Do Cards. Everyone should know how to earn things; this is how we motivate people to participate in lessons and jobs. We have to teach this important skill (see pages 291-298 of the PECS Training Manual, Second Edition), but once our students have mastered it, when a student makes a request, we might sometimes show that we can honor it, if the student will “make a deal” with us and complete a certain amount of work.

Visually indicate that something is unavailable. Items such as our Universal “No” Page , Universal “No” Symbols, or Tolerating “No” Pack can be helpful here. Visual reinforcement tools

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sometimes, the strategies above are almost magical, and one or more of them work very well for a learner or work in most situations. Of course, eventually we may be faced with a learner who is just plain angry about being denied access to something they want. We can all understand this feeling! In these cases, we need to be prepared, we may encounter Contextually Inappropriate Behavior, such as the learner breaking an item. It is important, especially with an older and/or larger learner, that the team has developed a response plan in advance, so if we have said, “No,” there is a way we can mean it and keep everyone safe.child in classroom

What we would never, ever do, and in fact see as an ethical violation, is take pictures out of a Communication Book of things that are unavailable. Although people don’t always have the right to get what we want, we DO all have the right to ask for what we want, in all situations, always. This can be difficult at times, but we see it as part of the learning process, and something that all people go through. Also remember that many Contextually Inappropriate Behaviors occur because individuals don’t have communication skills to get their needs met appropriately. In the long run, if pictures are removed from the Communication Book, or the learner does not have access to the Communication Book at parts of the day, we are removing the most important behavior strategy our students have, and we will eventually see WORSE behavior.

We can help you and your team effectively teach these skills to say no…and live to tell about it!

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© Pyramid Educational Consultants, LLC. 2021