A BCBA’s relationship with a client’s family can make or break that child’s progress. Find out more about the 6 resources we’ve used that parents LOVE.
Parent training is one of the most critical – and often most underrated and underutilized – components of ABA treatment. After all the treatment planning, supervision, program monitoring, and case management that goes into supporting a client, parent training can sometimes feel like a box you have to check just to stay on an insurance company’s good side. What behavior analysts sometimes forget (myself included) is that parent training and caregiver rapport can make or break a client’s progress.
When I started as a new BCBA, I had no idea what I was doing in terms of parent training or building rapport with caregivers – I didn’t have any children of my own and was so caught up in the science I struggled to make their child’s ABA treatment relevant to their lives. This meant that generalizing skills to home settings was a bit of a struggle. The piece of the puzzle that I was missing was understanding – I was seriously short on insight in how I could be doing better to demonstrate the value of ABA to parents and caregivers and to explain this very complicated field in a way that was relatable and approachable.
You do not have to struggle the way I did. I created a list of resources that completely changed how I interacted with parents, and, as a result, completely changed how I provided services to clients and their families. These 6 resources dramatically improved how I interacted with caregivers, how they interacted with me, and how we approached the client’s treatment together.
Here’s what we’ll be reviewing in this post:
- Parent Newsletters
- Take Home Notes
- Caregiver/Parent Training Summaries
- Parent Communication Logs
- Treatment Plan Support
- Insurance Support
Let’s review how you can use these same resources to support parents and caregivers in your own practice! The best part is that we’ve provided a FREE resource for you to use to build stronger relationships with your own clients and their families!
#1: Parent Newsletters
One of the easiest things you can do to get a lot of caregiver rapport is to keep them informed. Whether that parent is always on the run and difficult to nail down for parent training sessions or available any time you pick up the phone, they want to know what’s going on with their child’s treatment. Preemptive communication was the simplest thing to implement and the benefits far outweighed what I was expecting.
Parent training was way more effective and had better outcomes when parents actually trusted me and believed that I was a resource.
But first, they had to believe that I was actually a resource.
A parent newsletter was a quick, easy thing to draft up on a lunch break that covered what they could expect in the upcoming month, what updates they needed to know, important reminders for dates of events, and a reminder of how to contact me if they needed it. When I ran a clinic, this newsletter went to every family to remind them of what was going on in the clinic for that month. Parents loved this resource because they just wanted to know what was going on in their child’s lives. Our templates even followed a theme to change with the seasons to remind parents that ABA is fun, too!
As BCBAs we sometimes forget that parents are trusting us with their children and they want to ensure that we are doing the best thing for them. In my experience, parent training went so much better when the parents felt like they knew me and could trust that I was prioritizing their child and their treatment.
To improve your relationship with the families you serve, you can get a copy of the newsletters I used HERE! The best part is that the bundle comes with print-friendly versions and editable PDFs, making it super easy to complete in a way that works for you and your practice!
#2: Take Home Notes
Like I mentioned in the last section, one of the best things I ever did for my practice was keeping parents informed and updating them often. In my experience, the problem of “communicating too much” didn’t exist. One way I REALLY leaned into the communication with caregivers was implementing a daily take home note, which summarized the child’s session with the RBT and gave the parents some insight as to what was worked on that day.
I didn’t start implementing this one day because I had a genius epiphany that ended up revolutionizing my practice. What actually happened is that I nearly ruined a case when the parents of a client didn’t feel involved in their child’s treatment because I spent time with the child while they were at school and didn’t see the parents often. The take home note is what saved my case from being closed.
If you’re wanting to build rapport with caregivers, get a copy of the take home notes I love by clicking HERE!
Keep reading on to get access to your FREE parent training resource!
#3: Caregiver/Parent Training Summaries
If you’re like me and have to write everything down, a caregiver training summary is just what you need! It’s the easiest way to actually manage everything that goes on during parent training sessions, track progress on parent training goals, and collect data during your session. I’ve been VERY guilty of struggling to remember what I worked on with parents when reporting client progress to insurance companies. After I implemented this, I never had any issues again!
The thing that I loved most about this resource was that it not only kept me on track for parent trainings, but it kept caregivers on track too. Our meetings had direction and we were able to address parent concerns more efficiently. Parents really appreciated the transparency! I would fill out the form with them during the session and send a copy to them after the session ended. Not only did it improve my parent training sessions, but it built a lot of parent rapport too!
For your own copy, click HERE!
#4: Parent Communication Logs
For all the behavior analysts out there who can’t remember a thing unless you write it down, this one is for you. I struggled so much with having fantastic, in-depth conversations with caregivers about their children, making plans for future programming and skills to learn, and then remembering exactly none of it the second the meeting ended. There is nothing that breaks rapport with a caregiver more than not delivering on the promises you made about your work with their child.
And I made that mistake more than I would like to admit.
Way more.
Part of effective parent training and caregiver rapport is showing up where you need to be, doing what you need to do, and delivering on the promises you made. But first you have to remember what it is you promised. I created a parent communication log to simplify the process for me – I needed to know who I talked to, when I talked to them, and what we talked about, and I needed it all in one easily accessible place.
For your own copy of the parent communication log that saved my butt on more than one occasion, click HERE.
Don’t be like me – set yourself up for success with parents and caregivers by keeping track of their wants and needs for their child. You do not have to remember it all!
#5: Treatment Plan Support
Treatment plans make the ABA world go ‘round, but they can be VERY confusing for parents. I found myself spending a lot of time working with parents (especially those new to ABA treatment) to make sure they understood what the treatment plan was actually reporting to be sure that they fully consented to treatment. What I found was that providing supplemental educational flyers really went a long way to help explain treatment plans to parents who didn’t know what the treatment plan process actually meant.
I used this infographic and parents and families LOVED it. You can get your own copy to use with parents HERE!
#6: Insurance Support
The behind-the-scenes work that BCBA’s and ABA centers do to get a client on the schedule is sooo foreign to parents, and, let’s be honest, can be incredibly complicated for behavior analysts too. We created an Insurance Approval Road Map at Better Behavior Solutions to walk parents through the typical process of getting their child access to ABA services from initial contact to first session. This resource is FREE for you to use as much as you want with your clients and their families!
There you go, the 6 must-have resources to completely revolutionize your parent training sessions and build caregiver rapport. All of the products featured on the Better Behavior Solutions shop were designed to support these needs and set BCBAs, clients, and their families up for success. For more information about the strategies we use to create a balanced, effective clinical practice, be sure to check out our other blogs!
If you’d like to browse the shop, click HERE!