The SCERTS ModelThe SCERTS ModelBarry M. Prizant, Amy Wetherby, Emily RubinBarry M. Prizant, Amy Wetherby, Emily RubinThe SCERTS ModelThe SCERTS Model

Barry M. Prizant, Amy Wetherby, Emily RubinBarry M. Prizant, Amy Wetherby, Emily Rubin

A comprehensive educational approach for A comprehensive educational approach for children with Autism Spectrum Disorderschildren with Autism Spectrum Disorders

Charlotte Edwards, PsyDCharlotte Edwards, PsyDTanya Kim, MATanya Kim, MA

New Connections AcademyNew Connections Academy20072007

Domains of the SCERTS Model

Interdependent Trio

• Social Communication

• Emotional Regulation

• Transactional Support

Why SCERTS• Ongoing debate about what is most

important to teach and what are the most effective methodologies for teaching children with ADS

• Recent review of two decades of research on educational interventions for children with Autism concluded there is no evidence that any one approach is more effective than another

Why cont

• Most important, the panel argued for the introduction of a new dynamic approach to include educational priorities to include, functional spontaneous communication, development of social relationships and play skills with peers and acquisition of functional abilities in meaningful activities

• The authors believe these priorities are fully consistent with the SCERTS model

SCERTS• Social Communication• Emotional Regulation• Transactional Support

Recognized that the most meaningful learning experiences in childhood occur in everyday activities within the family and school contexts

Framework is designed to target priority goals in social communication (SC) and emotional regulation (ER) by implementing transactional supports (TS) throughout a child’s daily activities and across social partners

SCERTS• Respects and infuses expertise from a

variety of disciplines• Regular and special education• Speech-language pathology• Occupational Therapy• Psychology• Social Work• Medical• Parents and family members

Social Communication• Communicating and playing with others in

everyday activities and deriving joy and pleasure in social relationships with children and adults

• Children must acquire capacities in two major areas of social-communicative functioning

Joint AttentionSymbolic Use

Communicative means may be preverbal, such as gestures or use of objects to communicate or verbal, signs, picture symbol systems and/or speech ranging from single words to complex expressive language used in conversation

SC: 3 Stages of Social Communication Development

3 Stages

Social Partner

Language Partner

Conversational Partner

SOCIAL PARTNER:

Child communicates with gestures & vocalizations

LANGUAGE PARTNER:

Child uses symbolic means to communicate shared meanings (oral language, sign language, picture symbols

CONVERSATIONAL PARTNER:

More advanced language abilities and social awareness of others.

Emotional Regulation

• An essential and core capacity that supports a child’s “availability” for learning

• For a child to be optimally “available” he or she must have the emotional regulatory capacities and skills to

– 1.Independly remain organized in the face of potentially stressful events that may be either positive or negative in nature (self-regulation)

ER cont

– 2. Seek assistance and/or respond to others' attempts to provide support for emotional regulation when faced with stressful, over stimulating or emotionally dysregulating circumstances (mutual regulation)

– 3. “Recover” from states of emotional dysregulation or “attentional shutdown” through self-and/or mutual regulation strategies (recovery from dysregualtion)

ER: Levels of Development

Stages of ER

Behavioral Strategies Language StrategiesMetacognitive

Stage

Social Partner StageLanguage Partner

StageConversational Partner

Stage

ER: Behavior Strategies

• Simple motor activities or sensory- motor strategies that the child engages in to regulate his or her arousal level, remain alert, and self soothe.

• Examples: looking at one’s hands, seeking oral sensory input, etc.

ER: Language Strategies

• The child becomes a symbolic communicator.

• Language strategies are words or other symbols that the child uses that regulate his or her arousal level.

• Imitative or creative use of symbols to engage in audible or observable self-talk as well as inner language.

ER: Metacognitive Strategies

• A child’s ability to reflect on and talk about cognitive processes that support organization, decrease anxiety, and regulate attention and arousal to guide behavior.

• The process of internalizing a dialogue that requires coordinating different perspectives, which allows for greater social problem solving, inhibiting behavior based on social and moral rules, and using reflective problem solving( “If ___ happens, I can always do ____.”)

Transactional Support

• The third and final core component of the SCERTS Model.

• The most meaningful learning occurs within the social context of everyday activities and within trusting relationships, transactional support needs to be infused across activities and social partners

TS cont1. Interpersonal supports include

adjustments made by communicative partners in language use, emotional expression and interactive style that help a child to process language, participate in social interaction, experience social activities as emotionally satisfying and maintain well-regulated states

TS cont– 3.Family support includes educational

support such as sharing of helpful information and resources, direct instruction in facilitating a child’s social communication, emotional regulation, daily living skills and implementing learning supports

– 2. Learning and educational supports include environmental arrangement or the ways typical settings and activities are set up or modified to foster social communication and emotional regulation

Transactional SupportTS

• Learning occurs in a social context.• Thus, a child’s comprehensive

program should not only address a child’s developmental progress, but also the progress of that child’s social partners (parents, teachers, siblings, and peers).

TS Example Goal

Student Goals• Initiates

conversations about a variety of topics

• Initiates & maintains conversations that relate to partner’s interest

• Requests information about others’ experiences

Partner Goals• Models a range of

communicative functions & rules of conversation

• Uses supports to foster understanding of language and behavior.

SCERTS Model Approaches

• Meaningful Activities & Purposeful Activities (MA& PA)

• Learning & Playing with Peers (LAPP)

Meaningful Activities & Purposeful Activities

• Activity based intervention & joint activity routines

• Consistency & predictability• Structure & flexibility• Visually based with multimodal

learning.

MA & PAContinuum

• Planned activity routines• Engineered activities and

environments• Modified natural activities and

environments• Naturally occurring events &

environments

MA & PA: Types of Activities

Types

Goal- Directed

Cooperative Turn-taking

Theme- oriented

Learning and Playing with Peers

• Offers a child with ASD a systematic and semi-structured means to learn and apply social-communicative and play skills in predictable and supportive activities as well as natural activities.

LAPP

1. Planned activity routines2. Natural Interactions & Settings3. Control for novelty4. Shared control & reciprocity5. Unconventional behavior & social

play behaviors

Continued…

6. Intrinsic motivation7. Expressing a range of social-

communicative intentions & functions

8. Enhancing skills of peer partners9. Adult partner’s role

What SCERTS Is and Is Not

• Is a value based model with core values and principles that guide educational efforts

SCRETS Is and Is Not• Is not a curriculum focused solely on

training skills, but focuses on underlying capacities

• supports the development of functional skills, individualized for each child in a systematic and semi-structured, but flexible manner

• hierarchy of goals in social communication and emotional regulation informed by research on child development and based on each child’s needs and family priorities

Is and Is Not cont• Is not exclusionary of other practices or

approaches and flexible enough to incorporate from available approaches and teaching strategies

• SCERTS has been developed as a “next generation" model for working with children with ASD as a vehicle for helping to move education of children with ASD forward in a more comprehensive and meaningful manner