The ABA Parent Coaching Intensive

Most behavior analysts learned to write a strong behavior plan long before anyone taught them how to build a working relationship with the caregivers expected to carry it out. Yet the therapeutic relationship shapes nearly every part of parent training, from whether caregivers share what's really happening at home to whether they follow through between sessions and stay in services. When that relationship is strong, caregivers ask questions, try new strategies, and tell us when something isn't working. When it's weak, we see missed sessions, quiet disengagement, and plans that never make it into daily life. In this workshop, we'll look at what the research tells us about the caregiver-clinician relationship and its connection to treatment outcomes, adherence, and retention, along with what the BACB Ethics Code asks of us when involving caregivers in services. From there, we'll move into practical skills you can use in your very next session: specific clinician behaviors that build trust, intake and goal-setting questions that draw out a family's values, priorities, and daily routines, and reflective listening and validation strategies for responding to common caregiver concerns. You'll practice these skills throughout the session using practice scenarios. This workshop sets the foundation for the rest of the Intensive. You'll leave with a clearer picture of what a strong partnership looks like and concrete tools for building one with every family you serve.

Many behavior analysts walk into a parent coaching session with a goal in mind but no clear plan for how the hour will actually unfold. Without a predictable structure, sessions can drift into status updates, problem-solving on the fly, or long explanations that leave caregivers with plenty of information and little practice. A consistent session format gives both you and the caregiver something to count on, and it makes it much easier to notice when the relationship needs attention. In this workshop, we'll put the ideas from earlier in the day into practice. You'll learn the core components of a structured parent coaching session, from the opening check-in through the closing plan, and see a full sample session walked through from start to finish. Then you'll use a session template to plan a coaching session for a case example. We'll also look at what happens when things don't go as planned. You'll learn to recognize early signs of a rupture in the therapeutic relationship, such as missed sessions, quiet disengagement, or a caregiver who says "we already tried that," and practice steps for repairing the relationship and adjusting your coaching plan in response. You'll leave with a repeatable session blueprint you can bring to your next parent session, along with a plan for keeping the partnership strong when sessions get hard.