Below is a general skill sequence for introducing your learner to writing utensils.

Before a learner can trace, draw, color, or write, they need to be comfortable handling the tools. This skill area focuses on the basics: picking up a crayon or marker, holding it well enough to make a mark, making marks and scribbles on paper, holding the paper steady, taking caps off and putting them back on, and putting utensils away. It's important to check that the learner can sit at a table for short periods and imitate simple actions with toys. Proficiency in this skill area opens the door to tracing, coloring, and early drawing and writing.

How this skill area relates to your assessments!

This skill area aligns with various assessments and their respective domains, with milestone and domain codes provided for reference. Additionally, DSM-5 diagnostic criteria for Autism are included to help clinicians identify how this skill area potentially supports medical necessity in relation to the diagnosis.

VB-MAPP (Verbal Behavior Milestones Assessment and Placement Program)

• Visual Perception/Match to Sample, VPMS 2-M, Grasps small objects with thumb, index finger, and middle finger (pincer grasp) 5 times.
• Writing, W 11-M, Imitates 5 different writing actions modeled by an adult using a writing instrument and a writing surface.
• Motor Imitation, MI 7-M, Imitates 20 different fine motor actions when prompted, Do this (e.g., wiggling fingers, pinching, making a fist, making a butterfly)
• Group, G 7-M, Puts away personal items, lines up, or comes to a table with only 1 verbal prompt

AFLS (Assessment of Functional Living Skills)

• Basic Communication, BC21, Writes or types own name

DSM-V Diagnostic Criteria for Autism

• A2, Deficits in nonverbal communicative behaviors used for social interaction, ranging, for example, from poorly integrated verbal and nonverbal communication; to abnormalities in eye contact and body language or deficits in understanding and use of gestures; to a total lack of facial expressions and nonverbal communication.

CDC’s Developmental Milestones

• 18 months, Movement/Physical Development Milestones, Scribbles

Treatment Plan Goal Ideas

This is a list of treatment plan goals. These are different from the goals you will find in the skill sequence below. Your treatment plan goals encompass any number of goals from the skill sequence. Sometime they will include multiple goals from the sequence (”Learner will label 5 toys”) and sometimes the treatment plan goal will be simply consist of a really important goal from the skill sequence (”Will label caregiver”). An analogy I like to use goes as follows: Each skill sequence goal (commonly known as a “target”) represent each stair in a flight of stairs. The treatment plan goal is the flight itself.

Treatment plan goal ideas for this particular skill area are as follows:

• Learner will pick up a crayon and make marks on paper when instructed, “Let’s draw.”
• Learner will imitate scribbling on paper with a crayon or marker while holding the paper steady with their other hand.
• Learner will independently take the cap off a marker, make marks on paper, put the cap back on, and put the marker away.

Component Skills

Your learner may need to be fluent in these component skills first before introducing this goal/skill area. Component skills for this skill sequence may include skill areas that are fundamental to other areas. Fluency in the skill areas listed below may increase the likelihood that your learner will succeed in this skill sequence and those afterward.

Start at the top. Each indent is the next step.

• Intro to Reinforcer/Preference Expansion (RD-010)
• Intro to Sitting (RD-060)
• Imitates Actions with Preferred Items (IM-010)
• Imitates Actions During Familiar Routines (IM-020)
• Imitation with Uni-Functional Toys (IM-030)
• Imitation with Multi-Functional Toys (IM-040)

📍 YOU ARE HERE: Intro to Writing Utensils (AC-070)

Skill Possibilities

Below is a possible skill sequence for working on increasing your learner’s ability to handle writing utensils. Note that every learner is different and that you likely will need to tweak and vary some programming to their needs. Click the triangle icon to view the full description for each skill in the sequence/area.

Concurrent Skills

Working on these skills at the same time could help with goal mastery. Maybe your learner has mastered these skills already. Perhaps they are already listed as component skills above. That’s okay! Targeting other learning channels might help your learner.

Imitates Fine Motor Actions (IM-080)

Intro to Writing/Drawing (AC-020)

Composite Skills

These are the possible next steps for learners who have mastered, or are mastering, the skills listed above. Note that new skill areas may require fluency in other component skills not listed above. Also, you can introduce composite skill sequences prematurely to keep your learner progressing, as generativity may occur earlier than expected.

Intro to Tracing (AC-030)

🖍️Intro to Coloring (AC-050)

Follow the link below to better understand component-composite analysis.

Problem? Question? Suggestion? We want to hear from you!

Share it with us using our Suggestion Form

We’ll try to get back with you as soon as we can!

Ⓒ 2022-2027. Flatrock Advising, LLC. bxmastery.com.

Licensed for individual professional and/or clinical use only. Copying, scraping, or loading into other software is prohibited. See BxMastery Terms of Service.