Comprehensive ABA Therapy & Child Psychology in South Florida.

ABA therapy is effective across the entire lifespan, but our specific services focus on individuals from early childhood through adolescence/young adulthood (typically ages 18 months to 21 years).

Early Intervention (Ages 1.5–5): Focuses heavily on foundational milestones such as functional communication, play skills, toilet training, and school readiness.

School-Age & Adolescence (Ages 6–21): Focuses on social skills, emotional regulation, academic support, independent living skills, and vocational preparation.

A psychological assessment is a structured series of tests, interviews, and observations conducted by a licensed professional (usually a psychologist) to evaluate a person’s behaviors, thoughts, personality, and cognitive capabilities.

Yes. We believe that therapy is most effective when communication is natural and comfortable for the individual and their family. We strive to match families with bilingual or multilingual BCBAs and RBTs whenever possible to support primary home languages.

It is not uncommon for children introduced into an intensive instructional program to exhibit some “unusual” behaviors. While these behaviors may be odd or uncommon to you as the parent, they are very typical of children initially introduced to a highly intensive instructional program.

You can expect to see the following behaviors from your child during the first two weeks of therapy and following any significant changes in your child’s program:

• Crying/Tantrums
• Vomiting
• Urination or Bowel Movements
• Aggression
• Passive Non-Compliance (closing eyes and/or not attending to the therapist)

Our therapists are trained to deal with these types of behavior. Often, children exhibit these forms of behavior to terminate or to delay an unpleasant activity that is difficult for them or that they don’t wish to engage in. While we understand that it may be difficult for you to see your child reacting in this way, our therapists are trained to deal with these types of behavior.

An intake is conducted by a senior member of our staff to identify your child’s current level of functioning and to identify specific skill deficits and behavioral atypicalities. Your child’s individualized program will be developed to address these specific developmental skill deficits.

In discrete trial therapy, a child works individually with the therapist. Our approach entails repeated drilling of specific skills identified as deficient until the child has demonstrated mastery of these specific skills. Typically, discrete trial therapy is provided 2 hours per day each day for a minimum of 10 hours per week. Previous research suggests that 40 hours per week is necessary to attain maximum results. However, we have been able to achieve significant results with children receiving 10 hours of therapy per week. Our patients who have participated in less than the 10 hours recommended have demonstrated much slower progress or occasionally regression in the progress of specific goals. Therefore, it is highly recommended that you entrust us with your child for the recommended 10 hours per week.

A maximum of two therapists will be assigned to work with your child. We do this to ensure that more than one therapist is familiar with your child and his individual program in the case of a therapist’s illness or other emergency. In addition, it is facilitative for your child because he/she will learn to respond to instructions given by more than one person.

1. Intake: Submit an inquiry along with a diagnostic report (if applicable) and insurance information.
2. Authorization: We request approval from your insurance provider for the initial assessment.
3. Assessment: The BCBA conducts the evaluation and writes the treatment plan.
4. Therapy Begins: Once insurance approves the treatment plan hours, your scheduling and direct sessions begin.

In order to assist us in maximizing your child’s progress we recommend that you follow these general guidelines:

• Please bring your child’s favorite items that will help us motivate your child to learn (e.g., toys, food, videos, books, etc.).
• Minimize your child’s access to these favorite items prior to therapy to ensure that your child does not tire of these items.
• If your child’s favorite items include food, do not feed him a considerable amount of food prior to therapy.
• Bring photographs of favorite items and people/places within and around your home. It is often easier to teach children specific concepts when we are working with photographs of people and items relevant to the child.
• Avoid entering the therapy room during your child’s session. Often this indicates to the child that the therapy session has ended and will trigger emotional reactions in the child when you leave the room and the therapy session resumes.

Our Behavioral Language Acquisition Model (BLAM) is a form of discrete-trial therapy that is based on the precise principles and procedures of behavior analysis (ABA) and our current knowledge of child development. The model was developed by Lubin and Alexander in 1997 and continues to evolve as new principles are identified. The primary goal of BLAM is to address developmental skill deficits in the individual child and implement procedures in order to accelerate the child’s skills so that they may more closely resemble the skills of their age-related peers.

An autism assessment is a comprehensive evaluation process used to determine whether an individual meets the clinical criteria for Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD).

Sometimes called caregiver training, is a structured program where the BCBA teaches parents and caregivers the same strategies used by professionals to support their child. Instead of the therapist working one-on-one with the child in isolation, parent training empowers you to become the primary agent of change in your child’s natural environment.