Identifying Rooms to be Cleaned

Children with ASD can find the long-term goal of cleaning up difficult to master. For children with ASD, cleaning can be a daunting task, and so can figuring out what needs to be cleaned (for example, what areas or rooms need to be cleaned). This can lead to frustration and meltdowns. In order to help your child master the long-term goal of cleaning up, you can work with your child on the short-term goal of identifying rooms to be cleaned. Helping your child with the short-term goal of identifying rooms in your home that need to be cleaned can promote independence, build confidence, and develop organizational skills.

The following strategies may help your child make progress towards mastering the short-term goal of identifying rooms to be cleaned:

• Use visual aids for matching. Print pictures of clean (tidy, organized) rooms, as well as pictures of messy, dirty rooms. Start with bedroom pictures, and as your child understands the concepts of clean (tidy, organized) and dirty (messy), add different types of rooms or areas, such as bathroom, play area, kitchen, hallway, mud room, porch, yard, etc. Discuss with your child what makes a room clean, tidy, and organized, and what makes a room messy or dirty. For example, you might have one picture of a bedroom with toys and clothes scattered all over the floor, and a second picture of the same bedroom with the toys and clothes put away. Once your child understands the concept of messy versus clean rooms, start having them identify what specific items in the pictures render a room in need of being cleaned, such as toys and/or clothes scattered all over the floor, dirty dishes piled on the table, counter or sink in the kitchen, toothpaste all over a mirror or sink in the bathroom, etc. Use positive reinforcement to encourage them to learn to identify the rooms that need to be cleaned: offer a cool sticker, a piece of candy, a small toy, etc. Phase out the positive reinforcement when the skill has been sufficiently acquired. If the reinforcer for the behavior is a tangible item, such as a small snack or a token for a token board, ensure that it is provided with a great deal of verbal praise. Ideally, you want your child’s positive behaviors to be supported solely by social reinforcement.

Teaching Clean vs. Dirty Visuals by Basic Behavior Business | TPT (teacherspayteachers.com)

Clean this Mess! - Pre-K 3 Practical Life Matching by Samantha Forte (teacherspayteachers.com)

• Make it a game (treasure hunt). Draw a basic floor plan diagram of your home and have your child go through the house and identify the rooms that need to be cleaned on the floor plan diagram (for example, with stickers, with a crayon, etc.). You can also have your child identify the rooms that are already clean. Use positive reinforcement to encourage them to identify the rooms to be cleaned: offer a piece of candy, a small toy, read an extra bedtime story, etc. If the reinforcer for the behavior is a tangible item, such as a small snack or a token for a token board, ensure that it is provided with a great deal of verbal praise. Ideally, you want your child’s positive behaviors to be supported solely by social reinforcement. As they become more proficient, you may choose to reward your child for completing the entire house map at once rather than for each individual room, though it will depend on whether your child responds better to a small reward for each room, or a larger reward for completing the entire “map” (floor plan diagram). 

Create, insert & edit drawings - Computer - Google Docs Editors Help

Treasure Map PowerPoint Template by Mindful Design Co | TPT (teacherspayteachers.com)

For the short-term goal of identifying rooms to be cleaned, you can choose a target such as identifying if the bedroom should be cleaned, identifying if the living room should be cleaned, identifying if the bathroom should be cleaned, identifying if the kitchen should be cleaned, etc.

Identifying if a specific room needs to be cleaned

Step 1: Decide what room you would like your child to learn to identify as needing to be cleaned. For example, you can choose the target of identifying if the bedroom needs to be cleaned while working on the short-term goal of identifying rooms to be cleaned. The task analysis for identifying if the bedroom needs to be cleaned could be as follows:

• Create a checklist of items in the dirty or messy room that need to be put away in order for the room to be clean and tidy. For example:

• --> Books
• --> Toys
• --> Clothing
• --> Dust
• --> Trash

• Check the boxes of any items that need to be put away/addressed.
• Count the number of boxes checked. If more than half are checked, the room needs to be cleaned. 

Step 2: An initial/specific discriminative stimulus (SD) should be selected that will cue your child that the task will start. This SD can be a visual SD, such as two corresponding images (e.g., one image of a bedroom with toys and clothes scattered all over the floor and a second image of the same bedroom with the toys and clothes put away) or a verbal SD (“Time to decide if the bedroom needs to be cleaned!”).

Step 3: Collect baseline level data by providing the SD from Step 2 and allowing your child to attempt independently. The baseline level will vary according to your child and their specific abilities. For example, you can count how many steps in a row (from the task analysis in Step 1) your child can complete independently. Alternatively, if your child is able to complete the entire task analysis independently, record how long it takes your child to figure out whether the bedroom needs to be cleaned or not (e.g., 5 min, 10 min, 15 min, etc.). 

Step 4: To begin the trial to monitor progress towards meeting the target (i.e., the target of identifying if the bedroom needs to be cleaned), provide the SD from Step 2 and allow your child to attempt independently. When your child is successful, provide reinforcement. If the reinforcer for the behavior is a tangible item, such as a small snack or a token for a token board, ensure that it is provided with a great deal of verbal praise. Ideally, you want your child’s positive behavior to be supported solely by social reinforcement. If the behavior was not displayed, end the trial and provide the appropriate level of prompting on the following trial. For example, you can go to the bedroom with your child, bringing your bedroom cleaning checklist with you. Using the checklist, you can check the boxes of the items that need to be put away, telling your child what you are doing. You can say, “This bedroom is messy. We need to put away toys, books, clothing, and trash. That’s four out of five boxes checked, so let’s clean the bedroom!” 

Step 5: Collect data on how your child makes progress. For example, count how many steps in a row (from the task analysis in Step 1) your child can complete independently. Decide if you want to utilize forwards or  backwards chaining to teach the steps that your child may struggle to complete independently. Alternatively, you can track progress by recording how long it takes your child to complete all the steps from the task analysis in Step 1. Or, alternatively, you can track progress by counting the number of successful attempts at identifying if the bedroom needs to be cleaned over a certain number of sessions. 

Step 6: Track how your child makes progress to meet the target of identifying if the bedroom needs to be cleaned by comparing with either a number threshold or a percentage threshold (necessary to meet the target). For example, you can record the number of successful attempts at identifying if the bedroom needs to be cleaned over a certain number of sessions, and compare that with the number threshold necessary to meet the target. Alternatively, you can record what percentage of times your child can complete all the steps from the task analysis in Step 1, and compare that with the percentage threshold necessary to meet the target.