A prompt is extra help that makes a correct response more likely while a learner is still building a skill. Prompts get a learner to the right answer so you can reinforce it. Fading those prompts is how the skill ends up belonging to the learner instead of to you.
Why it matters
Most teaching programs use prompts, from discrete-trial teaching at a table to a self-care routine at home. Your supervisor writes the prompting procedure, and you deliver it the same way every time, record the prompt level on each trial, and notice when a learner is stuck. Prompts that are never faded can leave a learner waiting for help they no longer need, which limits independence.
Practice items for this task describe what an RBT does in a session and ask you to name the procedure, choose the next prompt, or spot a problem such as prompt dependence.
Key ideas
- Prompts are temporary. The goal is a transfer of stimulus control: the learner should respond to the natural cue (the instruction, the materials, the situation), not to your help.
- Two families of prompts:
- Response prompts act directly on the learner's response: verbal prompts (words or sounds), modeling (showing the response), and physical prompts (partial or full guidance). Gestures such as pointing usually sit in the same hierarchy, though some textbooks classify a point at the correct item as a stimulus prompt.
- Stimulus prompts change or add to the materials: making the correct card bigger, brighter, or closer (a positional prompt), or adding a picture or color cue.
- Prompts differ in intrusiveness. Full physical guidance is usually the most intrusive and a quiet gesture one of the least. Plans often list these in a prompt hierarchy.
- Least-to-most (LTM) prompting gives the learner a chance to respond with little or no help first, then moves up the hierarchy only if the response does not happen within the set wait time.
- Most-to-least (MTL) prompting starts with the most supportive prompt the plan calls for and steps down to less help as the learner meets criteria at each level.
- Errorless learning arranges teaching so the learner makes few or no errors, for example with MTL prompting, a 0-second time delay, or stimulus fading. It suits new skills and learners who find errors frustrating.
- Time delay fades prompts by adding a pause between the instruction and the prompt. Constant time delay uses 0-second trials first, then the same fixed delay (such as 4 seconds) on every trial. Progressive time delay increases the pause gradually (0, 1, 2, 3 seconds and so on).
- Stimulus fading gradually removes an exaggerated feature of the materials, such as fading a red highlight or a dotted tracing line, until only the natural stimulus remains.
Definitions
- Prompt: an added antecedent that increases the chance of a correct response while a skill is being learned.
- Prompt fading: gradually reducing or removing prompts so the natural cue alone produces the response.
- Least-to-most prompting: starting with the least intrusive help and adding more only as needed on each trial.
- Most-to-least prompting: starting with the most intrusive planned prompt and reducing help across trials or sessions.
- Graduated guidance: a physical prompt adjusted moment to moment, giving only as much hand contact as needed and moving toward shadowing.
- Prompt dependence: a learner keeps waiting for a prompt instead of responding to the natural cue.
Examples from a session
Four learners, four procedures
- Least-to-most: At home, you tell Ava, 5, "Put on your shoes" and wait 5 seconds. She does not start, so you say, "Shoes on feet." Next would be a model, then physical help, only if needed.
- Most-to-least: At a vocational program, Mr. Okafor, 42, learns to fold towels. His RBT begins with hand-over-hand guidance, then moves to partial physical guidance, then a model, as he meets each criterion.
- Constant time delay: In a clinic, you say, "What color?" and immediately say, "Blue" for Ezra, 8. Once he echoes reliably, you wait 4 seconds on every trial before giving the answer, and he starts answering before the prompt.
- Stimulus fading: At school, Grace, 6, traces her name over dark dotted letters. Over sessions the dots get lighter and fewer until she writes it on a blank line.
Non-example: Ava's RBT puts her shoes on for her every time, never waiting or giving less help. Nothing is faded, so this is doing the task for her, not prompt fading.
Whatever the procedure, record the prompt level on each trial, as your plan describes. If the data show a learner stuck at one level for many sessions, share them with your supervisor instead of changing the procedure on your own.
Common mistakes / exam traps
- Confusing stimulus and response prompts. If the materials change (size, color, position), it is a stimulus prompt. If you tell, show, or physically guide the response, it is a response prompt.
- Calling every pause "constant time delay." If the delay grows over sessions, it is progressive time delay.
- Giving accidental prompts. Glancing at the correct card or always placing it in the same spot can become a cue the learner follows instead.
- Never fading. Prompts kept after they are needed can lead to prompt dependence.
- Confusing stimulus fading with shaping. Stimulus fading changes the materials while the response stays the same. Shaping changes which form of the response gets reinforced.
Exam trap
Least-to-most vs most-to-least: ask what comes first. A chance to respond with little or no help, with more added only if needed, is least-to-most. The most help the plan calls for, reduced across sessions as criteria are met, is most-to-least.
Exam trap
Least-to-most prompting is not errorless: the learner gets a chance to respond, and possibly make an error, before any help arrives. Errorless procedures such as most-to-least or 0-second delay trials deliver the prompt before an error can happen.
Quick check
To teach Leo to point to the letter B, his RBT prints the B larger than the other letters and makes it a little smaller each session until all the letters are the same size. Which procedure is this?