Toilet training is of the essential skills that children should be taught during their early developmental stages (Richardson, 2016). However, children with special needs, such as autistic children, find it challenging to execute this function until later in life. Your discussion has identified some crucial skills needed to train an autistic child in toileting effectively. They include occupational, motor, processing, and social interaction skills. Although you have outlined these skills, it would be better to outline how the lack of these critical skills in an autistic child impairs their communication, interaction, and imagination. The absence of these skills in autistic children also makes them have difficulties comprehending what they are being asked to and hence may lack the desire to please anyone around them, including their parents (Richardson, 2016).
Your discussion notes that the motor skills may include performance skills representing small observable actions, including positioning the body, obtaining and holding objects, and sustaining performance. On the other hand, you have stated that process skills may include applying knowledge learned or organizing space and objects. Lastly, your discussion notes that social interaction may consist of initiating and terminating a performance, supporting social interactions, or producing social interactions. Although some autistic children may have these skills, healthcare professionals may still face hurdles in effectively training children with developmental disabilities such as autistic ones. A large section of autistic children do not have the motivation; as a result, it becomes difficult to establish when a child is ready to start toilet training (Richardson, 2016).
One last aspect that s worth noting in your discussion relates to the stages that caregivers or parents should take when toilet training an autistic child. When a healthcare professional is advising a caregiver, they should follow distinct stages and give suggestions to the caregivers that would help an autistic child develop the components or skills needed to toilet train. To add to your discussion, I believe health professionals should also give these children advice and resources backed by research. Doing so will help establish the degree or extent to which the advice provided is rooted in the current social norms (Richardson, 2016).
Reference.
Richardson, D. (2016). Toilet training for children with autism. Nursing children and young people, 28(2). https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26954645/
