How Can I Help? Prompting Procedures to Support Children’s Learning

Samantha is a 2-year-old girl who lives with her mother, Shalene, and her maternal grandmother, Doris. Samantha has developmental delays and therefore receives early intervention services. Samantha loves to play with dolls, swing at the park, and eat bananas. She is even having a banana cake for her third birthday party in 2 months! Samantha is very social and enjoys the attention from others when they praise her or clap for her. One of the goals on Samantha’s Individual Family Service Plan (IFSP) is to independently complete simple puzzles. Shalene and Samantha’s therapists hope that working on simple puzzles will help Samantha develop better fine motor skills, but they are not sure of the best way to teach her how to complete big knob puzzles independently. Darion is a 5-year-old boy with Down syndrome who lives with his mother, Sally, and his father, James. Darion attends the local Head Start program. He loves dinosaurs, grape juice, and his older brother, Jaxon. In the fall, Darion will attend Kindergarten at his neighborhood elementary school. One of the goals that Sally and James have for Darion is to be able to independently drink from a cup when he starts Kindergarten. Currently, Darion uses a spill-proof sippy cup because he often knocks the cup over when trying to pick it up or set it down. Darion’s parents, therapists, and teacher are collaborating on the best way to teach him how to drink from a cup. Many young children with disabilities struggle with recognizing a cue to perform a specific behavior, identifying what behavior is appropriate in response to a specific cue, and/or knowing how to perform the needed skill or behavior. Not knowing what, when, or how to perform a specific behavior can result in children feeling frustrated, developing antisocial behavior, or becoming highly dependent on others. To promote children’s development, learning, and independence, adults (e.g., parents, teachers, therapists, and other professionals) can provide assistance. An adult who is skilled in providing assistance can influence how quickly and accurately a child learns a new skill or performs it independently. The adult can arrange the environment to create opportunities for children to practice new skills. Adults also can teach a child a new skill by providing help or assistance through prompts, such as telling the child what to do, modeling how to do it, or physically helping a child “