Moyes, Rebecca

Mrs. Rebecca Moyes, a former teacher in both public and private schools for nine years, is the mother of two children. Her oldest is diagnosed with Asperger Syndrome. Rebecca is currently an autism consultant/trainer for several school districts in Pennsylvania and serves as President of the AVID Learning Center, a therapeutic center for children with disabilities located in New Kensington. She has published three books. The first, “Incorporating Social Goals in the Classroom—A Guide for Teachers and Parents of Children with High-Functioning Autism/Asperger’s Syndrome,” focuses on practical strategies to utilize in the regular education classroom to teach social skills. The second book, “Addressing Challenging Behaviors in the Classroom—A Guide for Teachers and Parents of Children with High-Functioning Autism/Asperger’s Syndrome,” helps teachers discover the reasons for problem behaviors and ways to create positive supports in the classroom to help prevent such behavior. Both books are published by Jessica Kingsley Publishers. Rebecca’s third book, “I Need Help With School!—A Guide for Parents of Children with High-Functioning Autism/Asperger’s Syndrome,” is published by Future Horizons and provides information to help parents to understand the special education laws as they relate to their child’s disability. Rebecca is a graduate of Grove City College and is pursuing a master’s degree in curriculum development.

Addressing Social and Behavioural Concerns For Children With Autism/Asperger Syndrome in the School, Home and Community

This presentation will devote the most attention to hands-on, nuts & bolts ideas for the classroom, home and therapy settings. Educators, parents and therapists will leave feeling that they have concrete ideas to apply in their own individual settings, rather than mere “theory”. The presentation will consist of the following parts:

Part I: A 15 minute introduction of the Autism Spectrum Disorders with an emphasis on high-functioning autism and Asperger Syndrome.

Part II: Identifying social language and social behavioural weaknesses and teaching for success. This section will focus on various teaching strategies that can be used in a variety of settings such as school, home and the community, as well as the development of appropriate IEP/IPP goals to facilitate social growth.

Part III: Addressing problem social behaviours. This section will focus on helping participants to discover what problem behaviour is communicating and the skill deficits the child may have. Participants will be presented with a wide variety of strategies to address each hypothesis for poor behaviour.