Errorless learning is an effective teaching method and an important part of Applied Behavior Analysis or ABA therapy. This technique focuses on prevention rather than correction and uses prompts to ensure learners arrive at the correct response every time until they are independent.
Errorless learning is especially helpful for people with cognitive limitations, such as autistic individuals, or people who have difficulty receiving criticism or feedback. It creates a positive learning environment so students remain motivated, interested, and focused on learning the skills rather than being anxious about making a mistake.
Core Concept Behind Errorless Learning
It is common for people to learn from mistakes. Failure is often seen as a lesson, and every setback comes with an opportunity to learn from errors. While this works for many people, some individuals with disorders such as autism or anxiety, may struggle to accept failure as part of the learning process.
Sometimes, failures can trigger challenging behaviors such as tantrums, aggression, isolation, or in extreme cases, self-injury. Additionally, there are some learners who have a higher probability of being successful at learning anything new if they get it right. When they complete a task successfully and receive positive reinforcement, they associate the task with the stimulus and learn to independently arrive at that solution.
It takes time, but practice and prompting are two techniques that can propel learners towards desired outcomes. Therapists or caregivers use prompts to direct the learners toward the right response and allow them time to practice the skill until they can reach the outcome fluently, without any external cues or assistance.
Thus errorless learning is an effective technique, especially for people with autism and/or anxiety, to acquire new skills by repeatedly making successful attempts rather than unsuccessful.
The Goal Of Errorless Learning
The main purpose of errorless learning is to prevent learners from making mistakes and to arrive at the right response every single time. The focus of errorless learning is on individuals reaching the desired outcome, not dealing with the frustration and consequent challenges that may come with failure.
This goal can be achieved by the following techniques that are frequently used to create an effective errorless learning environment.
Techniques for Implementing Errorless Learning
The following strategies are commonly used in ABA for various therapies but they are particularly helpful in making errorless learning effective.
Prompt Hierarchy
The Prompt Hierarchy technique uses prompts ranging from most intrusive such as physical prompting to least intrusive, such as visual prompting. Prompts offer a range of assistance, and the type of prompt used depends on the skill level of the individual, as well as the skill being taught, individual preferences and learning styles, and the environment.
For example, a child will learn to shake hands as a form of greeting if he hears his mother say “Shake hands when you say hello” i.e. a vocal prompt, faster than just seeing his mother shake hands with someone (model prompt).
So the type of prompt selected from the hierarchy depends on the comprehension level of the learner and directly impacts the effectiveness of the therapy session.
Error Correction Process
While the objective of errorless learning is to prevent errors, sometimes mistakes do occur. In that case, a contradictory response or punishment can push the learner away from acquiring the new skill or learning the task.
Therefore, it is important in errorless learning to redirect the students towards the right response by using a more intrusive prompt or by repeating the question. This approach can shift the focus away from the mistake and bring it back to the lesson.
Positive Reinforcement
This term is common in the world of ABA and autism, and in errorless learning, it plays a crucial role in reassuring learners that they have reached the correct response. Positive Reinforcement is motivating and encourages learners to associate the response with the salient stimulus, rather than with prompts that would not occur in a natural environment.
Errorless Learning Example
In this example, errorless learning is used to help the child successfully identify and name the animal "dog" through structured prompts and positive reinforcement:
- Full Prompting: The teacher shows a picture of a dog and says, "This is a dog. Say 'dog'." The child repeats, "Dog." The teacher praises the correct response.
- Immediate Reinforcement: The teacher gives the child a sticker as immediate positive reinforcement for the behavior of correctly identifying the dog.
- Fading Prompts Gradually: After several sessions of full prompting, the teacher starts saying, "This is a..." and waits for the child to say "dog" independently or may say the first letter of the word, “d.”
- Partial Prompts: The teacher shows the picture of the dog and pauses, allowing the child to say "dog" without full vocal prompting.
- Introducing Choices: The teacher shows pictures of a dog and a cat, asking the child, "Which one is the dog?" The child points to the dog.
- Generalization: The teacher brings a small dog toy and asks, "What animal is this?" The child says, "Dog."
Benefits of Errorless Learning
Errorless learning is popular because it is an effective technique that offers many advantages to people with learning disabilities or autism such as building confidence, reducing stress, and paving the road for faster learning.
- Builds Confidence: since errorless learning focuses on preventing the learner’s chances of making mistakes by using prompts, learners arrive at the right response more often. This process promotes confidence and a sense of achievement; by showing them they are good at a particular skill or task. Errorless learning liberates people and ensures they have a positive bond with learning new things instead of being overwhelmed.
- Reduces stress: anxiety, stress, and self-doubt are naturally reduced when people repeat successful attempts.
- Faster Learning: As a learner can perhaps avoid the mental and emotional consequences of failing at something, they can learn new things faster.
Conclusion
Errorless learning is an effective teaching method that is commonly used in ABA to assist learners with learning difficulties in acquiring new skills successfully. It focuses on preventing mistakes rather than correcting them, and hence creates a more relaxing learning environment. This approach boosts confidence in individuals and increases their chances of success.
