Episode 32 - Bridging Cultures, Empowering Families, and Expanding Access to NDBIs

In this episode of NDBI Navigator Narratives, Dr. Jamie sits down with Ohud Alhaqbani, BCBA, ESDM Certified Trainer, PhD researcher, and founder of ABA Blue Light, to discuss the power of parent-mediated intervention, cultural adaptation, and increasing access to evidence-based autism supports across the globe

Originally from Saudi Arabia and now based in the United Kingdom, Ohud shares her journey into the Early Start Denver Model (ESDM), her passion for Naturalistic Developmental Behavioral Interventions (NDBIs), and her work translating and adapting evidence-based practices for Arabic-speaking families. Together, Dr. Jamie and Ohud explore how parent coaching can help bridge service gaps, why cultural adaptation matters, and how empowering caregivers can transform outcomes for autistic children and their families.

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/315696768_Learning_by_Doing_and_Learning_by_Observing_Training_Parents_in_Saudi_Arabia_to_Implement_the_Natural_Language_Paradigm

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:02

Hey everybody, welcome back to another episode of the NDBI Navigator Narratives, our podcast designed to highlight community practitioners and researchers who are implementing naturalistic developmental behavioral interventions, or NDBIs, around the globe. And I am especially excited to have a ESTM co-trainer, certified trainer, Ahud Al-Hafbani with us today. And she is joining us from across the pond over in the United Kingdom. Ahud, welcome.

SPEAKER_01 0:36

Hi, thank you, Dr. Jamie, for inviting me on the podcast. I'm really thrilled and happy to be here today.

SPEAKER_00 0:42

Yes, I want to talk about your role as BCBA and CEO of ABA Blue Light, but I'm going to let you do that as you introduce us to yourself, what you've been doing, what you've been working on, your areas of interest. Let's let the listeners learn more about you.

SPEAKER_01 1:01

Okay. So yes, I do live in the UK, in the United Kingdom, but I am originally from Saudi Arabia. I've been working with Atested children and their families since 2005 with experience across clinical practice, parented training, staff supervision, program development, and leadership roles. And yeah, currently I am a PhD researcher at the University of Warburg in the United Kingdom. My research focuses on translation and cultural adaptation, specialized in planet-mediated and normacy intervention for autistic children in Saudi Arabia. Trying to bridge that gap between the research and the cultural adaptation, and how it is very important to do adaptation to any program because mostly all what we get, all the programs are built in a Western countries and different languages, which is sometimes, if we translate it and give it to families, it doesn't make sense, it doesn't fit the society well. So this is what I'm doing now with my PhD. Alongside, as you mentioned, I'm a CEO and the founder of ABA Blue Light. It's a platform that aims to increase access to evidence-based practices, especially in autism and neurodiversity resources in Arabic. Again, there's a huge gap in the Arabic resources. So this is what I'm trying to do with the ABA Blue Light platform. Helping families, professionals, individuals, and organizations as well to get those evidence-based materials and how they implement it in the Saudi culture.

SPEAKER_00 3:04

Yeah. And now you are a CEU provider as well, correct?

SPEAKER_01 3:08

Yes, yeah, yeah, that's correct. Yeah. Yesterday, or sorry, maybe Saturday, I just gave a lecture about the importance of um early Sardenber model and how it's important and how can you see the improvement uh in early intervention.

SPEAKER_00 3:29

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 3:30

Yeah. So through my career, I've been very passionate about my work and how I want to make a change and impact in the family life, especially like the families, um, for young children and early intervention, how it's very important and how it can make a huge difference in the child's behavior, um, either like cognitive, uh, communication, socially, like every aspect. It's very important. And this is what I'm trying to build now in that getting this bridge and helping those parents where they are not finding the proper services in their area.

SPEAKER_00 4:17

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 4:18

That's why we provide everything online so they can have it easy access.

SPEAKER_00 4:22

I love that. And I love that you have it in a way to help support the culture that they're in and adapt it to the different cultures and languages. And I am so incredibly excited that you are helping us and partnering with us to translate the NDBI Navigator Notes newsletter. So that is in Arabic as a resource to share with professionals and providers, parents, caregivers. It's just nuggets of information to keep you up to date with everything. And it's now in Arabic, which is just a dream.

SPEAKER_01 4:55

Thank you so much. And thank you to give us the opportunity to translate it because we're all in the same field and we need that collaboration between therapists and like organizations because our goal is one to have meaningful resources that fits everyday routine, and it's sustainable for the parents and everyone, and it's easy access, like they can get anything and they can teach with it online at the fingertips.

SPEAKER_00 5:22

Yes. And I know um listeners that have been on the show have heard me talk about. I went to school in the UK, I lived in the UK, love the UK, don't love your hot weather right now. I know you're sweating. But how different it is in terms of getting access to care funding wait list. There, there's always a bottleneck everywhere, but more so in other countries. And I think that you probably are encountering that as well in the UK, as well as families and centers you might be supporting in Saudi Arabia. Long wait list, no resources, no funding, which is why parent-mediated is so incredibly one, it's effective and incredibly helpful for families, but also it gets immediate access to something while they're waiting.

SPEAKER_01 6:12

Yes, it's very important. It's I cannot emphasize that, that's parent-mediated is very important because even here in the UK, and they have like more and more like psychiatrists and more psychologists, but if they have two paths, either they go private, which is really expensive, and a lot of families they cannot afford it, or they go to the, let's say, the Ministry of Health pathway, which is there's waiting list and a crazy waiting list for diagnosis. For example, uh for um autism diagnosis, it can take two years waiting lists. It depends where you stay and where where are you living and how available are the services, like a psychiatrist who's gonna do the diagnosis.

SPEAKER_00 6:59

And then the wait list for the provider.

SPEAKER_01 7:02

Yes. So it's just crazy. And then you need to find, I know a lot of parents they will move from town or a city to another place, to another town, to another city, so they can get the services. And this is not in the UK, also as well in Saudi. We have the services in the major cities, and the smaller cities and the towns, they're not such lucky as the capital and the major cities in Saudi Arabia. I see that in both countries, and that can affect negatively on the child's behavior, development, and communication, and every like everything in all the domains of his development. So parent-mediated, it's filled that gap. When you teach the parents simple things, how that can improve like amazingly in the child's life and skills.

SPEAKER_00 8:03

Yes. When you say fill the gap and bridge the gap, what's coming to my mind is mind the gap when we get off the table. It's just immediately going back to mind the gap. But you're right, it is such a divide between kind of what we find in research, getting into practice, what we know of best practice, research supports, getting accessibility out there to the families that are waiting. And I always think about it as this um, this visual of a SLP who had talked to me one time and she's like, think about the 30-minute speech therapy service as a marble. And one marble is 30 minutes of that child's day. And if we support parents and coach parents and caregivers, we fill up the rest of the marbles in the vase for the rest of the hours of the day. And look how much access children are getting to support, working on goals, stretching those strengths. And it was such a visual mind shift for me to really think about what we do outside of the quote unquote therapy is just as equally important, if not more, for those families.

SPEAKER_01 9:12

Yes. You said it so well. Yes, it's very important. Yeah. Because again, not every family is lucky to find a service where they live. And sometimes to move to another city where there's a service provided so hard, they're gonna leave family members. Uh you know, depends on the family dynamic, how they live. Yeah, I know parents, they she the mother will move to a major city and leave her husband and other kids just to get them in their hometown because she wants to support her kids, the other one is to have a diagnosis of autism, and then to get the more services that's it's better for him or for her, other than they don't find it anywhere in their original hometown. So, yes, yeah. I always think about it. I love how she had a speech therapist, say it's about Marvels. I always think about it as like a map, and how you draw the map and you include the parents with you in that map. It's like a big canvas, and we do it together.

SPEAKER_00 10:16

Yes, yeah, I like that visual. I was thinking about that when I was naming the company, the navigator NDBI, again, navigating the journey, navigating the resources the right way, that compass or direction to guide professionals to NDBIs, which is the world that I live in, that I think are incredibly effective for the very young children that we support. How did you get into NDBIs? What's your what was your interest that kind of pulled you into it?

SPEAKER_01 10:46

So when I start my journey, like any other behavior analyst, like my background is like um structured, uh systematic instruction, uh instructions, clear objectives, and database decision making. And after I finished my master's degree, I was introduced to ESDM. And at that time, it was like my very first time I ever heard about it. And um I was like completing the certification, and I changed my field, it's like to focus more on early intervention, and I saw the magic of it, of the NDBIs, how can change the life of that child and how the parent, it's a very big role in that intervention. And after that, everything is like NDBIs, it should be the first thing the behavior analysts should learn, then they should learn the systematic instructions and how to do like structured sessions. But yes, it's very meaningful and very uh you can see how the effect and the impact, and you can see the change, like not immediately, but you can see it gradually, especially with young children. And you can see the family, how they are happy. You can see that reflecting on them because they come and join us in the session, they see, they learn, that we include them with us, they take that experience and they do it at home. And as you mentioned, they practice more so the child has more opportunities.

SPEAKER_00 12:30

I think a parent, speaking for myself as a parent of a neurodivergent child, wants to do anything they can do to help improve the quality of life for their child. And I also feel that they want to do the most that they can do to try to help and be a part of that journey, that map, if you will, sketching out the way to go and how empowering it is to finally get some strategies to help you connect with your child when you want nothing more to do, and you're just struggling and you don't know how to get that relationship and how to get that connection, which gets us communication, engagement, joint attention, and all of those other incredible skills that we need. And so I think it's a benefit to the child, but I also think it's an incredibly priceless benefit to the families who also get some quality of life improvements with it.

SPEAKER_01 13:21

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 13:23

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 13:24

It's very important. Yeah, I can't tell you I agree with you 100% because I see it. I see it with my children, I see it, as you mentioned, with your child, your child. Uh, we see it with children that we work with. When I started ABA Blue Light at the beginning, I was aiming for therapists to train them to be RBTs. But with time, I was like, no, this is not the need. The parents who need the support. And we shift 180 degrees our services to provide more and more. So when everything that we have at on ABA Blue Light is for the parents, and the second is for the neurodiversity uh society, like adults and teenagers, how we can support them. And then the third hierarchy, it would be the professionals, but we're aiming for the parents first. This is our main goal because we know how parents they need it.

SPEAKER_00 14:21

Yes, and I think that gives you another great resource. You have your professionals kind of at level three or stop three, if you will, but also if the parents have access to these incredible courses and resources and tools that you have available, that's something that the professional can also access and then support that collaboration, working together, like you mentioned, of professionals get access to resources the same as the parents, and they have this wonderful foundation to learn from each other based on the stuff that you're creating to keep it kind of symbiotic, if you will. Which is really cool.

SPEAKER_01 15:02

Yeah, we've we're building more um inclusive uh society. We want to have more better quality of life, not only for the child, also for the parent. And um now all the therapists that I supervise, I work with, it's like you need to implement and like natural development behavior intervention. It is important. You only you don't teach only uh the strict trial training, but also you have to teach it like any skill that you teach the child, you need to move it to natural environment way, like anything just related to the environment, use different things and you can do it. And that's why in my research now I'm focusing is like parent-mediated uh teaching their kids normacy, but how? Because normacy is very important. We we see numbers everywhere, we use it with number um money, uh, we use it to the clock and everything. How can they use it in their daily life routine? And this is what I'm teaching families. It's like I'm not even asking them to do a lot of work, it's like 20 minutes a day. We can understand how parents can be busy, they have other responsibilities, they have different kids. Even more if the parent, the mother or the father are working like full time, yeah, they don't have the luxury of time. So we don't ask them a lot. It's like 20 minutes a day, yeah, five times a week. Yeah, it's gonna make a huge difference in your child's life. And we saw that in the research. We did like a pilot study, okay, and we saw that like parents, like when we did post, uh we're not testing any effectiveness. We know that the program is very effective. We're just testing the accessibility and um visibility. And when I saw how the child's behaviors and skills improved, I was like, wow. Is that much? And we didn't ask that much, it's only 20 minutes a day, five times a week.

SPEAKER_00 17:12

It was amazing. Yes, and I think about some of the parent ESTM studies, you know, some of Dr. Vasmaro's can 90 minutes a week, right, make a difference. And it can, and it just goes back to that testament of the power of the parents and caregivers and being able to help them really understand like what's the right thing to work on for you and your child at the right time in the right way that makes the most sense for them as opposed to more of a coaching model, right? As opposed to me coming in as a behavior analyst who might come in from a different perspective where I'm gonna train you and I want you to do it, and I'm gonna take data. And I'm not saying we don't take data and give suggestions and a coaching model, but it's a very different perspective.

SPEAKER_01 18:02

Yeah, the parents become a partner. They're not like a trainee and they get training, they become a partner in this journey. So it's very important to them to learn in the way that is meaningful for them and it suits their daily life. Each family has different routine and different aspects and how they are and different roles. So when we have them from the beginning, you're my partner, you're gonna do this, and we're gonna we're gonna support you here, and this is the tools that you need.

SPEAKER_00 18:34

Yes, you can do a lot with yes, I love that. And I really love when you talked about kind of giving parents some concrete, just 20 minutes, right? Just something measurable that they can put into the schedule and really target practice work on, or pushing into their routines. So pushing into a bathtime routine and just maybe adding five more extra minutes because you're working on pointing to the duck or asking more water or pour it on my head or whatever it is that you're working on, that you could just extend those routines and get a little bit more time as well, and layer in those learning opportunities where these children are doing these routines every single day, multiple times, in some cases, with regards to dressing and toileting and feeding. There are numerous opportunities to teach this children and to support that learning. If we think about the environment, as you mentioned, has this really big enriched language learning aspect to it, as opposed to a table or a really small attentional focus of some stimuli or materials. It's that bigger, broader generalization, like you mentioned, of all of this is the teacher. And we can use it.

SPEAKER_01 19:56

Yeah, yeah. And even on in the research, we included like when they achieve the goals, we can include siblings and other family members to generalize other skills. You can use it in different environments, you can go uh to the supermarket, and they can use numbers. So in a very natural way, we just did it. So yeah.

SPEAKER_00 20:20

I think that's another really neuro-affirming aspect. We have to think about the environment around us, and I love the inclusion of the siblings. I think back to many years ago, I used to go into the home with my bag of fun therapy materials and go have fun on the floor and do our work. And the siblings couldn't come in the room and they couldn't play with the fun toys, and they couldn't be a part of it, and how upset and jealous and angry a lot of them were about that, as opposed to inviting them in and being able to have them as a play partner and an extension of that, and just again for their mental health well-being, that they also feel included and get that attention as well. So I love that you had the siblings in there as well to work with.

SPEAKER_01 21:09

Yeah, and it's also good because it's increased the interaction and the social interaction between them and they keep the siblings more understanding how their other siblings, how they their brain works, how they learn, and it helps them to understand their needs and how to communicate with them. So, yes, parent mediate, it's just amazing. And with and if you make it with the NDBIs, it's it's a magic. I know.

SPEAKER_00 21:38

I talk about NDBI and ESTM as magic. And as a behavior analyst who is conceptually systematic and analytical, it seems wooish, like woo. But I'm telling you, when you see it done well in practice and it just clicks, obviously, there are contingencies and reinvene, all the things are lining up, but it just looks magical because the kids are having fun. And we're making those outcomes and we have this great acquisition progress, and the families are involved, and it just feels like this super simple thing that happens magically, but it's not, it's so much work that's going into it to bring it all together.

SPEAKER_01 22:16

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 22:16

That's feel magical sometimes when you see it.

SPEAKER_01 22:19

When you see the outcome, yes, it's like, yes, this is what our aim, this is our goal, and we achieved it, and everyone is happy. You can see it in the parent's face, you can see it in the child's house, you can see it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 22:33

Yeah. Yeah. What are some of I'm just thinking culturally? We talked about cultural adaptations. Yeah. Differences that you might encounter supporting parents or professionals in the UK versus over in Saudi? Is there some certain trends that you pick up on or certain areas that they need more support in in one area than another?

SPEAKER_01 22:56

It's how the family dynamic and the culture itself and the other daily routines. Because in Saudi there's different things, and the day it's totally different. So the kids might stay longer in the weekends because they go to the grandmother's house and see more family gathering and you know the extended family, which is in the UK, sometimes you see that, but mostly the families are smaller. Uh there's not much an extended family. So those are the differences. And also in Saudi, we have everything in Arabic. So everything we talked about is going to be in Arabic. And there's um there's we need to put in consideration like prayer time and um how we include those things like in the prayers and different uh um like Islamic um related to the religion of Islam in their daily routine. And how, which is different again in the UK, you can find different religions, but they don't embed it that in their daily routine as in Saudi, because one of the things that we teach the kids, even they are verbal, non-verbal, we teach them how to memorize al-Quran so they can say it, and how do they do prayer, and because they want their kids to follow the same religion and they do the same routine so it doesn't become like there's a difference. Which is here, they focus more on the behavior and the social uh and the will-being, which is really nice, but you see it's both, it's very nice how they do it, but it's different between the c two cultures and the family structure and the way they embedded like different daily routine in their daily life with the NEDs, you know.

SPEAKER_00 24:55

Yes, yes. I think that'd be, and I think that just really highlights the inclusiveness. We, regardless of your vocal, verbal, non-verbal, non-vocal, however you want to say it, we still have this expectation that we want you to be a part of this really important aspect of your culture. And we keep that we presume competence, we keep that expectation up there, and so we have them um with the ability to fit in and to be included in those really important life and cultural daily routines that they have.

SPEAKER_01 25:24

Yeah, because this is the family daily routine. So, yes.

SPEAKER_00 25:28

Yes. One of the things that I encountered when we lived in Albania was really the perception of professionals. You're the professional, you're the expert, you do it. Um, very different to some cultures I've worked in where the parents are open and wanting and feel comfortable getting coached and then doing it. Um if you encounter that as well.

SPEAKER_01 25:52

Yes, yes. In the UK, there are more. Uh like they want to learn the mothers and the parents, and they want to teach their kids. In Saudi, you will find two groups.

unknown 26:05

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 26:05

One, they're like, I want to be just the mother. Yeah. I don't want to take the therapist's role. I don't want to do that. I just want to like, you know, give my son or daughter all the love. And I understand, I understand the way they're thinking. And some mothers like, no, and some parents like, no, we want to learn, we want to help, we want to like include everyone with us. Like, everyone can help. So it depends honestly on the family and the way the parents is thinking. So we have it either they want to learn, it's like, no, please, you do everything, and I just want to like just be the mommy. I don't want to say no, I don't want to be strict, I don't want to like give instructions, I just want to give hugs and loves and kisses. It's like, you can do that as well. So it's different. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 26:56

Do both. Yeah, it's challenging. It can be really hard to find that balance because we want parents and caregivers to do a little bit of both, right? We don't want them to be the therapist. But if there is no therapist in their area, somebody has to step up and help work on those skills and balance it with the mommy, grandma, caregiver, daddy role and be able to go back and forth. And that can be very overwhelming, I think, for a lot of families. But then the alternative is do nothing and wait. So for those families who have access to people who can come in and be the expert, that dynamic is probably different than a family who I don't have anyone to help me. I gotta help myself help my child.

SPEAKER_01 27:41

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 27:42

Which is all families that go through I can see it.

SPEAKER_01 27:46

Yeah, I can see. Um, when I used in in Saudi and working in a clinics, I would see like um a child who's 11 years old, and this is the first time he ever had a service because the parents were like in a very long time in denial, or there was like there is no point of doing that, and we don't have like the transportation effort, or we don't have the luxury of time, or we don't have the fees to do that. And now the child is 11 years old, not toilet-trained, not independent, and he doesn't request, you know, it's just like you can do a lot for your child. But again, it depends on the family and how the way they think and how they it's not easy. I know it's not easy to like have a child under the umbrella of neurodiversity. It's different from family to others. Some families they will like give up and just like sit, you know, it depends on the personality of the parents, and some parents they would like, no, I will not be there, I will find every single way to help my child. And there's parents they were like, I will help my child, and we have the resources, and we're gonna take an advantage of the resources. Like, either they go to private and they have the money to do it, or they go find the services, which is like governmental or state uh services, and they were moving from place to another place, like city to another city to find the services. And yes, they might not do anything, but then we will find the parents, they will like work very hard for their child.

SPEAKER_00 29:29

Yes, I know. There's some of the most incredible advocates that I know are parents, because I don't think any professional wants that child to make progress as much as their parent does and loves them as much as their parent or caregiver does, to be able to support them. And I think it's that team approach again that you know so important in the ESTM that we work across different professionals and backgrounds, and then we have parents as an active part of that child's treatment team or intervention support or however we want to call that because it does make such a difference.

SPEAKER_01 30:03

Yes, it does. Like we give to like kids, they give this cool, they give kids homeworks and they ask them to do it at home with their parents, right? The same thing when they learn uh music, playing piano, cello, guitar, they need to practice. They need to do more lesson. So more practice, that means more repetition, better skills, reminding, and more repetition, better outcome.

SPEAKER_00 30:33

Yeah, I like that analogy of the more practice for the musical lesson or reading, that we do have those expectations for parents to help their um children with those particular skills that we want to see continue to develop, generalized, grow. And then thinking about that, that we have the same thing for the goals that we are working on, that there needs to be some more practice and support. So I really like that analogy. I'm gonna borrow that and I'll give you credit for it. You have your homework and you do your lessons, it's the same kind of concept for some families. Yeah. Do you have any resources or or advice for people that you'd recommend who want to learn more about NDBI? Do NDBI for parents. ABA Blue Light is incredible. You have a wonderful platform. So much parents and caregivers, and also professionals who can come in and learn. How do you stay up to date? Or where do you get information on all the incredible things that are happening?

SPEAKER_01 31:37

Oh, a lot. Like attending a lot of resources, never stop learning, reading research, literature, the science, everyday change, and there's everyday new thing, a new study. And it's it's nice to be updated and see what others did and how you can take that and just adapt it and do it and um and work with it. So always you need is like I'm not uh I'm not like a I'm ASDM trainer and I'm PhD researcher that I'm not gonna look what there's in the literature talking about it. The learning never stops because with the the intervention changed, and we're in in a very now, I guess, very fast era. Everything is changing around us in a very fast way. We need to keep up with it. And reading research and seeing what others did and implementing it, it's very helpful. You don't invent the wheel, you just take it and adapt it.

SPEAKER_00 32:40

Just rolling it.

SPEAKER_01 32:42

Yeah, just fix it and adapt it to fit your society, to fit the parent that you're working with. Um, again, we we they are a partner with that with us. We don't give them the tools and like take it and go work with it. We uh adjust it to suit their daily routine, their family, um dynamic, their the the context of the place they are from. Um we do a lot of things, not only one thing. And this is what I always try to teach therapists. Like you need to understand the family background, what it's okay, what is not. Maybe it's what is okay for you, it might not for this family. So you never uh measure it to yourself. You need to understand better the family. You can ask them.

SPEAKER_00 33:32

Yes, I was just gonna ask you, how would they do that?

SPEAKER_01 33:34

I could ask them we need to fix it or we need to adjust it to suit you more, and yes, so again, they are a partner in that journey, so they should be included. And this is what I teach therapists like always ask the parents, even the simple small word, how do you say it? What do you call this? Some cultures they they name one thing, like different names. You need to ask the parents, not from your knowledge, you need to ask the parents what do you call that? Like in the hot in the house, and then take that and implement it. And this is how you do it. And if the parents are struggling, just make things simple. Write it down, you know, yeah, write it in steps, small steps, not complicated, no professional language. If you need to use any professional language, put the definition next to it, give an example to make it easy. Because when they find it difficult, they will give up. And we don't want them to give up. We want to help them. And modeling, just record some videos, show them. And if the parents work, give them feedback, give them a very constructive feedback in a very friendly way. Again, there was the parents, they're trying their best, they're not professional, they might do something wrong. It's okay, they're trying their best and they're learning. We need to use kind words with them. It's like, yeah, just tell them we're seeing what you're trying to do. We thank you so much for doing that, but let's try this way. We don't tell them this is wrong what you're doing, because that might go in a negative way.

SPEAKER_00 35:26

Yeah, no one wants to hear that. Yeah. I think about the coaching again, like the modeling you mentioned, being able to see somebody do it or watch a video of a strategy and action and how to get that change in behavior that we're looking for for whatever aspect that it might be. That modeling coaching part can be such a really important tool to have. And I think too, if I'm trying to put a conditional format in an Excel file and I'm reading my instructions on Google and I can't figure out the menu to get there, my next thing to do is to go to YouTube and look for a video where I can see it step by step. Oh, I forgot to tell it I was on a Mac. It's different. And so that is almost my go-to now is I go to YouTube first to find something for a video model to show me, to then go back and create a formula that I'm working on. And it's just sometimes so simple, like you said, like that, oh, that I can do. I didn't know that's what you wanted. Yes, I can do that, and then be able to see it. So I think that's very powerful for families to be able to see what to do and to find that balance of us not always being the one who does it well, where they feel defeated or discouraged. We want them to have the win and to celebrate their hard work. And I really appreciate how you said thank you and thanking them for what they're doing. Because I wonder how many times they really hear that on the daily for helping support their children. I think that's a really nice message to have.

SPEAKER_01 37:04

Yeah, and one of the things when I used to work with families, I will do it and I will do mistakes and implementing the intervention. I was like, what do you think? So they would know that it's okay to do mistakes and no one is judging. We're here to learn. And also, we did a conduct a study I was a part of with a team. We did um parent modeling. Parent will observe other parents, how they implement the intervention.

SPEAKER_02 37:32

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 37:33

And the result was the parent, the observer parent learned as the parent was like we give them the feedback and everything, and the modeling, because they were there step by step and observing how the other parent is implementing the intervention, and they are hearing our feedback and the way how they implement it. And then when it became their role to implement where their kids after the observation for a few weeks, they did it really good and they implemented correctly because they've been a very good observer and they learned from the other parent.

SPEAKER_00 38:10

Multiple exemplars. Is that the study out, like published? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, I'm gonna get that link from you, and I want to put that for people who I want to read it. And then for listeners who also want to look into it. That's a really cool extension of parent coaching, working together, having a community, learning from one another. I think that's fantastic. And I don't know a lot of those studies that exist. So that just makes me start thinking about the rabbit hole that I'm gonna go down to learn more about this, because I I don't know that many that come to my mind, and I'm sure they're out there. That's a really great idea. There they go, the wheels are spinning.

SPEAKER_01 38:49

Yeah, you know, like peer, how we teach kids, like peer uh mediated, how you teach us like the same thing. Parent mediated. So there's another parent will help another parent, and this is what we want to build, a society that helps each other.

SPEAKER_00 39:03

Yeah, full of resources and tools to do it together because they have what they need. Oh, this has been incredible. I love this conversation with you. If there was one thing that you would encourage people to do when supporting parents or caregivers, parent-mediated, what would that be? I know there's a lot of things.

SPEAKER_01 39:27

Yeah, there's a lot. Be patient. Yeah, remember that they are parents and always, always be kind to them. Yeah, because we want them to be always motivated, because when we lose the motivation, the child loses the intervention. And that will impact yeah, that will negatively impact on the child's skills and development. So we always, always need to be kind, even though if the parents are not if they are rude, we need to understand their state of mind. Again, they have a kid that there is a need, we never we don't know what the stress they are under it. We need to be more compassionate, more empathetic to understand. And we we want to help them to help their child.

SPEAKER_00 40:17

Yes, I love it. I love how you talked about. I always talk about motivation matters for the children, and just as much as what you just said, if the parent loses the motivation, that could be the intervention that is a loss, and that could be a you know a big detriment. So being able to help parents stay motivated and stay the course and get that reinforcement for their behaviors is something that I think we can all do and do better at. So I love it. Thank you for your parting words of wisdom to be patient and be kind and to listen and to keep that motivation going. This has been such an incredible conversation with you, Ahud. And I'm really, really thankful for your time and sharing your insights.

SPEAKER_01 41:00

I'm so happy to be here today with you. And I really love the work that you're doing. And I'm learning a lot when we do the translations like, yes, we need to do that. And I love how we collaborate as ESDM trainers or like behaviors in the field because we want to support each other to support more the society. So thank you for including me and inviting me in the podcast.

SPEAKER_00 41:27

It's been wonderful. Thank you so much.

SPEAKER_01 41:30

Thank you.