Using Visual Activity Schedules for Young Children With Challenging Behavior

Young children with challenging behavior may require individualized interventions to facilitate improved outcomes. Visual activity schedules (VAS) have been well documented for improving engagement, transition, and recreation behaviors with children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and intellectual disabilities (ID). However, children exhibiting challenging behavior in inclusive preschool settings do not necessarily have an ASD or ID diagnosis. This study evaluated the use of constant time delay (CTD) to teach three children without ASD or ID to use VAS. Engagement and challenging behavior were measured in the context of A-B-A-B withdrawal designs. Children learned to use the VAS and levels of engagement and challenging behavior matched levels similar to typical peers. However, children did not generalize schedule use to novel contexts. Results suggested that CTD+VAS may be a feasible individualized intervention to increase engagement in young children with challenging behavior who do not have ASD or ID.