Teaching supported employees with severe mental retardation to solve problems.

Two adults with severe intellectual disability worked at a community job site. They kept running into small problems like a jammed copier or a missing tool.

The trainer taught them to talk themselves through fixes. First they learned a short script: 'What is wrong? What can I do? Try it. Did it work?' They practiced on many different problems, not just one.

Both workers started solving new problems on their own. If the tape dispenser jammed, they used the script without help. They even fixed issues no one had trained.

The skills lasted. Weeks later they still used self-talk to handle work snags.

Leung (1989) had already said people with ID can create problem-solving rules if they see many examples. C et al. put that idea to the test and showed it works in real jobs.

Lucki et al. (1983) used self-monitoring to cut disruptive talk. C et al. moved the same self-management idea to learning new work skills.

Sprague et al. (1984) compared ways to teach vending machine use. General-case training with three exemplars won. C et al. used the same 'train many examples' trick, but added self-talk for office problems.

You can stop hovering. Give the worker a short script and five or six practice problems. Script plus varied examples equals independence. Try it during job coaching next week.