What are the steps that comprise this job?
Making a list of all job duties prior to employment or training is a primary means of preventing complications. Review the job duties by visiting the site or reviewing the job description. A visit to the site can help determine relative amounts of time in which the employee will engage in each duty. It is strongly suggested that you devise a clear list of the duties that appear to be within the student’s immediate abilities (can be taught within a few repetitions or practices) vs. duties that will require more training. Consider initially presenting the graphic organizer to show the student the various tasks in the job. Creating this dual list of strengths vs. teachable jobs can assist the success of the project or job match. The list can also be used as a starting point to negotiate the responsibilities that fit the project or supervisor’s needs for a specific quantity and quality of work while also fitting the student.
Graphic Organizer – Strengths And Targets
Given what the student can do presently, how will you present the tasks so that the student can perform steps within his capacity while learning a new step?
Do not underestimate the value of strategically carved job training experiences!
In childcare, there are so many situations, issues, and predicaments that even a volunteer experience requires careful evaluation before setting it up. Judgments about care, about conflict resolution, about discipline, etc. are frequent and provide virtually no opportunity for error. Mishandling discipline or care can easily be a serious error that compromises placement. The decision to support a student in volunteer or part-time childcare employment involves carefully planning the responsibilities of the student so that success is most likely. Carefully consider how much direct interaction with children is practical. Your goal is to design the set of tasks so that social judgments are not too demanding. A student who is motivated to work in a childcare facility may benefit from a ‘volunteer’ job training that occurs after school in a childcare setting in which he performs very specific tasks on a consistent basis for short periods. Or would summer employment/volunteer experience be possible? Cleaning and organizing various areas of the childcare facility can be on a rotational basis so that the student moves from area to area quite predictably.
Job carving in both childcare and food preparation may involve just a few hours of work per day at first and this can be a positive aspect to the job. Building stamina for work performance is often an issue so consider limited responsibilities that are cyclical, repeatable and predictable. Also, reduced work hours may help assure that number and variety of tasks are within the capacity of the student. Will visual instructions be helpful for the student in food preparation or in supplying a busing station? How will you assure easy access to the visual supports to perform multi-step chores? Creating multiple sets of visual instructions may be necessary.
Consider that the student works in a food preparation job at a restaurant during the summer. He arrives at 9:30 am to begin his duties. After putting up his belongings, putting on an apron and hat, and washing hands, his first task is consistently to restock the busing station. The task analysis for this task may be as follows:
___1) Clean out flatware drawer with sponge and disinfectant spray.
___2) Fill flatware drawer with table knives, steak knives, forks, soup spoons and spoons. Take drawer to dish station.
___3) Drain and wipe out tea machine with clean hand towel.
___4) Fill tea machine with water to fill line. Turn on tea machine.
___5) Wipe down all salt and pepper shakers.
___6) Fill salts and peppers.
___7) Place salts and peppers on tables.
___8) Place condiment containers on tables.
___9) Wipe down ketchup bottles and block them on busing station.
___10) Restock napkins.
___11) Restock placemats.
___12) Rinse out coffee pots.
___13) Fill coffee pots with water to the line.
___14) Prepare coffee filters and start coffee pots.
___15) Add tea bags to tea machine.
___16) Wipe down busing station.
Check schedule.
Obviously, the process varies according to the setting. However, the number of steps may be so many that the checking off of these steps in the task analysis is necessary to assure completion of all steps every day in the correct order. Also, note that making coffee is at the end of the list. The shorter the time that the coffee sits, the better the coffee will be. As well, the water in the tea machine needs to heat before adding the bags. Having the process defined in clear steps before the student faces the task can only support performance and reduce frustration for all.
Generally, teach the steps of the task in sequence to build a routine while prompting the student in a manner that will assist those difficult steps. For instance, you find on the first day that the student does well with most of the steps. However, he needs job coach monitoring to carry the flatware drawer to the dishwashing station so that he can fill all slots with the different types of flatware at one time, reducing unnecessary transitions and increasing speed of performance. You add a highlighted cue on his list and prompt him to the list when he reaches that step. In this way he attends to the cue and more independently completes the task without personal prompts.