Why are communication skills so important for your child?

 

In many cases, your child may not know how to appropriately communicate what they think, feel, want or need. Often times this results in challenging behaviour as a means to communicate. We want to reduce this frustration for your child and to help them interact with others. This is why throughout our programs we work heavily on building basic communication skills as well as promoting continued language acquisition.

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Children with ASD often have difficulties interacting socially. Through our programs, we teach children to recognize contextual cues so that they can be more successful at interacting with others.  Play skills are also an important part of social interactions, especially when making and maintaining friendships. We teach your child how to play with specific items, games and activities as well as important social play skills such as sharing, turn-taking, and joining in. 

 

Whether your child is getting ready for school or is already in school, we can work on skills to help them achieve their maximum academic potential. During early intervention programs, we build pre-academic skills so that your child is prepared before beginning school. For our school-aged children, we collaborate with teachers to help best support your child's daily needs at school. 

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Is your child ready to be toilet trained?  We'll take a look at your child's toilet readiness and developmental skills to help you make that decision. When we feel your child is ready, we'll help you get started! Generally, toilet training starts as an intensive 1-2 day hands-on training in-home with your Supervisor. Parents (and therapists) will then continue the program while receiving on going guidance from their Program Supervisor. 

 

Does your child have difficulty sleeping through the night? Do they refuse to go to bed or to sleep in their own bed?

 

We can help! ACMC staff is experienced in providing sleep training. This service includes assessing why your child is having difficulties and addressing the issue through a systematic sleep plan. Your Program Supervisor can help you get the plan started at home or can provide this service via telephone coaching. 

 

Challenging behaviour can present itself in many forms. At ACMC we assess why challenging behaviour is occurring in the home or school setting and create a plan to reduce it. This plan will include teaching your child new strategies to replace unwanted behaviours, such as the ability to communicate what they want. Challenging behaviours often get in the way of learning opportunities. For this reason, reducing challenging behaviour is one of our main focuses at ACMC so that we can ensure that your child is ready to learn!

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