Manding Question

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Hello Everyone,

We have been doing a VB program with my daughter, Hayley, for about three years

now. She was profoundly non-verbal when we began with a non existent receptive

repertoire, but now has a couple hundred words (sign paired with vocal

approximation) that she can mand, tact, and receptively identify. She

spontaneously mands for things when she wants them, however, she is a very

withdrawn child who rarely wants anything, so her daily mands are still mostly

contrived by us. She learns new mands tacts, and rec id within a day or two on

average, and we have recently added verbs to her mands (two word requests) and

that is going remarkably well. Receptive commands (like " put the cup on the

table " are still a challenge for her, taking on average 3 weeks to master.

Recently, Hayley, has been able to participate more in the classroom (she is in

typical all day kindergarten with a one on one aid, she is pulled out for IT

half of the day). For instance she is able to follow the directions during P.E.

without help from her aid. (Her classmates tend to help her if she needs it.

In fact they try to help her too much, but they really want to help.)

This is our problem, we see wonderful things happening when the aid backs off,

but then our daily mand numbers drop from 500+ to around 200. How important is

it to maintain the 500-700 mands per day as a child moves from early learner to

intermediate learner? The aid would typically be with Hayley during gym having

her mand for the ball each time during their game, but when she pulls away we

see the nice following directions and peer interactions, but no mands. There

are many points during they day when the aid is faced with the decision 'should

we work on mands or let her blend in?'

I know manding is critical in the beginning, but does its prominence in the

program stay the same or change as the child progresses?

Any help or advice is greatly appreciated.

-Kim

Mom to Cady, Hayley and Corey