MODULE: Time Delay

Overview of Time Delay

Many of the characteristics of ASD have important implications for planning and implementing instruction. In particular, learners with ASD often have considerable difficulty transferring and adapting skills learned in one context to another setting. As a result, they often become dependent upon prompts from team members and/or peers to use particular skills (Allen & Cowan, 2008; McCormick, 2006a). For example, a learner with ASD may not put his coat on every day at dismissal until the teacher tells him to do so. Prompt dependence limits a learner’s ability to generalize the use of skills to new situations, activities, and with a variety of individuals. Time delay is particularly effective at preventing prompt dependence because prompts are systematically faded so that learners with ASD must focus on naturally occurring situational cues, rather than prompts, to use a target skill (McCormick, 2006a).