Comparison of Prompting Strategies on Two Types of Tasks With Children Diagnosed With Autism Spectrum Disorders.

Four preschoolers with autism needed to learn intraverbal questions like “What flies?” versus “What do you eat?”

The team used a blocked-trials procedure. All “bird” questions came in one block, then all “food” questions in the next block. Blocks shrank as kids got answers right.

After mastery, the questions switched to a mixed, quiz-style order to see if the skill held.

Every child mastered both intraverbal sets. Most kept the skill when questions were shuffled.

Blocked trials acted like training wheels. Once the kids could tell the categories apart, the wheels came off and the bike still rolled.

Roncati et al. (2019) saw the same success with preschoolers, but they varied which prompt the child saw first. Both studies show prompting tweaks can unlock intraverbal learning.

Schnell et al. (2020) went one step further. They ran a five-minute assessment to pick the best prompt for each kid. Their message: blocked trials work, yet a quick test might let you personalize even more.

Eikeseth et al. (2009) used prompt-delay to move from object sounds to object names. The pattern is the same: start with extra help, then fade it so the target word controls the answer.

If a child is stuck mixing up similar questions, try blocked trials first. Stack one category, reinforce heavily, then thin the block and mix. Check Schnell et al. (2020) when you want to tailor prompts, but blocked trials give you a ready-now option that has worked across four kids and two follow-up studies.