Customer Reviews

The Verbal Behavior Approach: How to Teach Children with Autism and Related Disorders

5 star:		(30)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

As a mother of three children on the spectrum, I want to share how much this book has changed our lives forever. Hope is a powerful feeling and one given to us from this book.

We were going along following the "standard" recommendations of the professionals working with our children on the spectrum without much change for over the past two years. Sure, we had some changes, but not like the ones we were about to experience using the Verbal Behavior Approach.

This book was very easy to read and did a great job of detailing exactly how to do what we were reading about. For us, the concepts were all completely new and a totally different way of intervening. Having Mary Barbara's personal story throughtout the book helped make it more real for us as a parents.

This book has given us the power to help our children ourselves. No longer do we have to follow recommendations from others that just don't seem "quite right" for our children. We have the tools to make a difference ourselves. The therapists we do have that work with our children, are much happier also and feel a better sense of direction now. They have told me how much more hopeful they feel now having the resources they needed. They report that following the Verbal Behavior Approach has changed them professionally as well.

We have spent the past few months working through behavior problems with our children. I am glad to report that for my middle son, age 4, 20+ meltdowns a day is literally down to none or an average of 3 a week. What a difference! We have our lives back! Each child on the spectrum is different of course, but I just wanted to share one personal detail in this review to give specific evidence of the changes we are experiencing.

We feel so much closer and more connected to our kids. I don't know what more a parent with a child on the spectrum wants. We are forever grateful. I highly recommend this book to anyone out there who wants to help their children, clients, family member, and self grow and learn. I recommend this book to parents on the spectrum and parents of non-spectrum kids as well.

We still have a long road ahead of us, but we are up for the journey having the resources we need now. (This book stays by my side and I refer to it daily.)

As a practicing Board Certified Behavior Analyst I am constantly writing detailed treatment plans for parents and home treatment teams - an enjoyable yet tedious task. Trying to simplify the technical terms and concepts of Applied Behavior Analysis for people unfamiliar with Skinner's terms has suddenly become easy due to this highly readable and thoroughly enjoyable text. Parents can easily relate to the pain of the initial diagnosis Ms. Barbera received for her son. More importantly, she gives hope and a solid program outline for implementing the Verbal Behavior approach to even the newest participant in this world of spectrum disorders. A "must read" for anyone who wants to see their child or client progress.

This book is one of the best books out there for ALL parents to read. It gives you great ideas and help for a child with a disability, but it also works for typical children. I love the way the author writes to you like she is talking to you directly, like you have been friends for years. This book is great and I would highly recommend it to everyone I know.

As a parent of a child with Autism as well as a Board Certified Behavior Analyst, I have found this book to be a must have for parents and educators alike! It's an easy read with a very personal touch. I ordered books for my son's teacher and therapist and plan on purchasing more for my clients. Mary Barbera takes Skinner's analysis of Verbal Behavior and makes it parent and educator friendly. A must-have!!!!

As a Board Certified Associate Behavior Analyst, I find myself recommending this book to my clients on a daily basis. Applied Behavior Analysis is a very complex field. Barbera takes some pretty difficult concepts and shows us how to apply them in an interesting and easy to understand format.

Applied Behavior Analytic techniques are tried and true interventions, backed by decades of scientifically validated (and replicated)research. I noticed in the review by Tara, she recommended against ABA techniques in favor of developmental approaches. While it was extremely interesting to read her review from the perspective of a High Functioning woman with Autism, I would like to reiterate that ABA is backed by decades of research and the importance of intensive behavioral intervention for individuals with autism cannot be ignored. Tara mentioned the importance of teaching communication-- this is covered in depth in Chapter 5 of the book. She also mentioned the importance of teaching a child to be interested in her and her actions-- I'd recommend re-reading Chapter 4 on reinforcement and pairing. Chapter 10 discusses using the child's motivation during Natural Environment Teaching (NET). Also, the ABLLS can be used as an assessment and curriculum guide so you can be sure you are teaching skills in a developmentally appropriate sequence.

Again, this book is an excellent guide for parents and clinicians to use. I'm very impressed with it and recommend this book to all!!!!

Considering that this book deals with subject matter that is, to say the least, difficult to understand, the writing style makes the trip far more interesting than laborious. Although Barbera is listed as the main author, I suspect that the second author--Rasmussen, is the one responsible for the easy flow of the therapist's ideas.

Barbera gives good advice, and not just for Autistic children, but for children in general. This book should be recommended to all parents and parents-soon-to-be.

This isn't so much a review of the book's structure as a review of the books content (i.e., the Verbal Behavior,) but as a quick aside - the book itself is well written, user friendly, and meant as an informative introductory course in VB.

On to the content...I am on a sort of lifelong search for the Be All End All Autism approach, from RDI to Floortime to ABA to VB. No luck yet. I find that VB, like all of the other therapies out there, has it's pros and cons, and is by far more appropriate for certain types of children than others.

Pros:

- VB relies heavily on communicating in order to get what you want. Asking for favorite items, actions, songs, etc. Even later skills like asking wh- questions are centered around motivation, i.e., if a child loves candy they learn to ask 'Where' the candy is in hide-and-seek type games. Personally, I think this is primarily the most powerful thing about VB. Children who are not socially motivated and never had a 'reason' to communicate before suddenly have one, and this alone can accomplish a lot.

- VB is fairly concrete and tangible. Unlike other programs where goals can be murky, what you are working on and how the child is progressing is clear and easy to measure.

- VB takes a positive approach toward the child, engaging them via positive interactions and reinforcement.

Cons:

- The biggest con in my opinion is that VB never strays far beyond very functional language. It revolves largely around children learning to use language in order to have wants and needs met. Now, certainly, for less verbal children, this may be the primary focus. If a child never develops a complete language system and you have to pick and choose what you teach, well, being able to make your needs known is probably one of the most important things.

For children with more language, however, functional language is typically one of the skills that come easily to them. It's the social language and 'high level' (i.e., imagining, reasoning, wondering, etc.) type language that doesn't develop on it's own, and I think VB does a poor job of addressing this.

- It's a bit rigid. VB follows the line of thinking that EVERYthing is behavioral, behavioral, behavioral. Positive and negative reinforcement from the environment control every single thing a child does. I personally don't believe this, and have behavioral plans fail when they came up against something that was not controlled by simple positive/negative reinforcement. This can also be a problem when working with other professionals - there is not always a lot of flexibility regarding integrating other approaches.

Great book for parents who want to learn how you can get to the real potentials of your child with hard work I also think it is of great value for profesionals too, who can also benefit from clear and simple explanations. You can read book in three days if you have some knoweledge in ABA/VB and you can get good advices and gaudiness for your work I especially like the way Mary Barbarea put her personal experiences in book but kept profesional attitude/

This book was very helpful to a beginner to VB. It is written in a way that is easy to read and is very parent friendly.

I am an LCPC and a BCBA. I work with kids on the autism spectrum at a public school and with home ABA/VB programing. This is the very first book I give my parents to read. It does such a great job of explaining verbal behavior, it is a big time saver for me. I highly recommend this book to parents and professionals. If you ever get a chance to see Mary speak make sure you do.