Discrete Trial Instruction/Discrete Trial Teaching
Discrete trial instruction (DTI) or discrete trial teaching (DTT) has historically been the primary instructional method used in ABA intervention for children with autism. It is a very systematic and methodical way of teaching and is supported by a history of success in teaching skills across all areas. This technique is well suited to individuals with autism because it makes instruction very clear to the learner. Discrete trials are comprised of several components. 1. an SD, or a discriminative stimulus (an instruction) 2. a response (what the child does in response to the instruction) 3. a consequence (feedback to the child about his/her response) There has been some research on the most effective ways to teach when using discrete trials. Here is a summary of several of those issues. 1. Teach in an errorless way. We know that children with autism have a tendency to repeat errors, so it is important to prevent errors and to interrupt errors whenever possible. (It is rare that anyone could learn a skill without any MYTH DTI is just doing the same thing over and over and over again. FACT Historically, people did do DTI as blocks of trials, typically working on the same target behavior repetitively. Children were asked to do the same thing many times
errors. The point here is to minimize the errors that a learner may make.) 2. Mix in new material with older, known material. Technically, this is called task interspersal. For interspersal to be effective, you must mix in a new item with items that learners know very well (have already mastered). We know that learners learn more rapidly when taught in this way. It also is more naturalistic than asking a child to do the same thing many times in a row. 3. Collect data on learning progress. This may be done on a trial-by-trial basis, or through probe data collection techniques (in which the teacher takes data only on some of the trials). Discrete Trial Instruction is sometimes described incompletely or inaccurately. This is because DTI has been conducted for many years, and the definition of “best practice” DTI has changed along with the evolution of the field of ABA. Therefore, some people’s views of DTI are only partly accurate because they do not have the most up-to-date information. Here are some of the most common misconceptions that people may have about DTI. (most often 10 times) in a row. While we know that repetition helps learning and that children with autism require many trials of instruction to learn new things, we also know that learning is more efficient if we vary what we ask the child to do. Best practice now dictates that we slowly intersperse new items with things the child knows very well.
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ABA Principles & Methods
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