What You Can Expect During Parent Training
Why parent training matters
It’s easy to think we should be able to handle everything ourselves, even difficult behavior. But, this attitude can lead to mounting conflicts, higher levels of frustration, and ineffectual ruts that impact the whole family. Instead, parent training provides evidenced-based ways to manage a child’s behavior more positively and calmly — and the process can improve your entire family’s quality of life.
Our team relies on applied behavior analysis (ABA) therapy to support and encourage children with behavioral or developmental disorders. This scientific, evidence-based approach focuses on optimizing a child’s environment to increase desired behaviors. Our process involves a highly personalized approach tailored to your child’s needs, including:
- Their unique behaviors
- How they learn
- How their environment influences them
It also requires consistency to reinforce the positive behavior. So we provide parent training to ensure you have a clear understanding of your child’s needs along with strategies to continue their progress at home.
Setting the stage for good behavior
Our parent training sessions take place in a collaborative environment. Our overall goal is to develop a strong management plan based on your child’s particular problem areas. This guarantees that everyone has clear expectations for positive and inappropriate behaviors. We also outline measurable guidelines, so everyone can identify when the behaviors occur.
A key aspect of parent training is helping you understand how to set the stage for good behavior and avoid potential triggers that can lead to negative ones. Our ABA methods rely on positive reinforcement, so we work closely with you to help you master these important parental strategies.
Ways to create a therapeutic and positive environment include:
- Clarifying expectations prior to a potentially problematic activity
- Remaining aware of and avoiding your child’s triggers, such as crowds or hunger
- Offering a choice to empower your child (but not too many choices to overwhelm them)
- Providing a countdown for transitions, such as taking a bath or going to bed
- Having immediate, effective, and appropriate consequences for misbehavior
- Being consistent with all of these strategies to reinforce cooperation
We also know firsthand that daily life is often unpredictable, but we can help you and your child learn to cope when things don’t go according to plan. That’s why, in addition to these strategies, we also provide you with tools to help you and your child adapt to unexpected changes.
Parent training comes with numerous benefits. Not only does it provide you with the knowledge and skills you need to support your child, but it can also increase positive outcomes for both of you. And, for many parents, these training sessions can even improve and enrich the relationship they have with their child.
Do you want to learn strategies and practices to encourage positive behavior in your child? Learn more about parent training by booking an appointment online or over the phone with Scottsdale Pediatric Behavioral Services today.