Special Learning Sessions Quiz
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The correct answer is FALSE. There is no set time for how long your first learning sessions should last. It’s very important for your child to enjoy his learning sessions, and not to find them boring, frustrating, tiring, or difficult. Children vary a great deal in how long they are able to pay attention. Most very young children, under the age of 2 years, can only sit still and pay attention for a few minutes at a time and for some, 30 seconds to a minute may be all you start out with. For this reason, you will need to watch your child very carefully and try hard to end the learning session before your child shows any signs of distress. You should begin learning sessions with a 2 or 3-year old by working together in very short sessions, increasing the length of the sessions very gradually. Begin to increase the sessions when you see that your child can pay attention for longer and is enjoying all the rewards and praise you are giving him. This will work well even for an older child, but with the older child, you may be able to increase the length of the sessions a bit more quickly.
2. When you’re first starting your learning sessions, you should give instructions that:
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The correct answer is D. The general idea is to make doing what you ask as simple and enjoyable as possible, so that your child will learn to pay attention to you and do what you ask. For this reason, you would not want to use complicated language that will be hard for him to understand, or ask him to remember two things instead of one, or ask him to do something he doesn’t like. You would start by using very simple language, and ask your child to do something he enjoys and is likely to do, like placing a piece into a favorite puzzle as you say, “put in.”
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The correct answer is FALSE. If you keep alternating back and forth, the child will learn to do these actions in an alternating sequence and then he won’t need to pay close attention to what you are doing in order to get it right. If you demonstrate these actions in an unpredictable order, he will really have to pay attention to you, in order to imitate your action correctly.
4. Which is often the easiest kind of imitation to teach, and therefore the best to start with?
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The correct answer is C, imitating actions with objects. Imitating words and sounds can be difficult for some children to learn because they are hard to prompt. There is no easy way to get your child to make a sound with his voice or to say a word. For some children, imitating actions without objects, like clapping, can be easy to teach, but for most children, doing something with an object, like tapping a spoon on a table, or putting a block in a cup, is easier to teach and can easily be prompted with a gentle physical prompt.
5. Which kind of instructions are usually a little more difficult for children to learn to follow?
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The correct answer is B, following instructions without objects. Following simple instructions with objects, or when paired with a gesture, are skills that generally come first in the usual course of child development. The object and/or the gesture serve as a kind of hint or prompt. For example, if you’re using a peg board toy, you could hand your child one of the pegs, point to a hole in the board, and say “put in.” Even if you don’t point to a hole in the board as you give the instruction, handing the child the peg with the peg board on the table in front of him should be a good hint about what you want him to do. After the child has some experience following simple instructions with an object or gesture, he can begin to understand the instruction without an object or gesture. That’s why we usually teach children to follow simple instructions with objects, before we teach them to follow simple instructions without objects.
6. What are two advantages of using small bits of food as a reward?
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The correct answers are A and B. Small food treats are very rewarding for most children, and if you praise your child just before you give the treat, your praise becomes even more rewarding. It’s also true that if you keep the treats very small, they are eaten quickly and then you can move on to the next trial without having to take anything away. C is not correct because you never want to withhold the child’s basic food needs to use as rewards. Getting his basic nutrition is extremely important, and should not depend on how well he does in his learning sessions. D is not true. Children can get tired of food rewards. In order to prevent your child from getting tired of his rewards, use very small pieces and change the food rewards before he gets bored with them, or give him a choice of two or more different food rewards.
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The correct answer is FALSE. Children learn language at very different rates. Some children, for reasons that are not well understood, have a very difficult time learning to understand any words. If you have worked on teaching your child to follow simple instructions for a while without much success, you should back off and focus on teaching other skills such as imitating movements, or pointing to request, and wait a few weeks before you give it another try. And, if your child has not already seen a specialist for a developmental evaluation, this is another indicator that you should try to make sure he gets one as soon as possible.
8. Which would be the best pair of objects to use to start teaching the child to match?
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The correct answer is C, matching two identical teaspoons. All of the other pairs of things certainly are similar; they are either from the same general category of things, or are only different in color, but none of them are exactly alike, except for the two teaspoons. Children will get the idea of matching two things that are alike most easily if the two things look exactly the same, so that’s the best way to start.
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The correct answer is TRUE. It is usually easier for a child to learn to match identical objects before learning to match identical pictures. However, there are always exceptions. Some children may want to play with the objects, and don’t focus enough on matching them. In that case, it might be easier to start with pictures.
10. You are working on imitating sounds. You have already worked on matching, following simple instructions without objects, and motor imitation and you are now about 10 minutes into the teaching session. Your child is getting tired and frustrated and having trouble imitating any sounds correctly. What would be a good way to end your session?
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The correct answer is B. Give him an instruction you know he can do, prompt if necessary (but hopefully it won’t be necessary since this instruction should be an easy one for him) and end on a note of success. Whenever possible, you want to end your sessions with something the child can do, which will allow you to give him enthusiastic praise and a reinforcer without running the risk of reinforcing fussy behavior or non-compliance.