Are you arranging opportunities for the student to practice the targeted skill in natural environments and under natural conditions?
Consider how the natural supports within the setting can continue to benefit the student’s performance. Someone should be assuring that visual supports are also in place. The supervisor can be endorsing the environmental design of keeping specific materials in one place to assist performance and organization by expecting all employees to keep those materials in the same place.
Someone at the job can verbally praise and reinforce the student for specific target skills that require praise. A set time for feedback can be written in the student’s schedule.
Have you adapted visual supports so that they can remain in the natural environments that this student encounters now, and in the future?
Constantly consider how to incorporate visual supports, where they are housed for ongoing use, and how they can be maintained (and not accidentally discarded) by co-workers or supervisors. Creating a file box, notebook, or other visual supports for the student may prove helpful. Consider carefully with the supervisor where to store these materials. Also think in terms of what visual supports can remain present at all times for all personnel in the form of laminated and printed signs, labeled tool areas, posted directions for multi-step tasks that are frequently performed, reminders on safety procedures, etc.
Students who achieve success in using visual supports can become their own best advocates in assuring that they have those supports in future settings. Teaching the student how to care for the supports and keep them stored in specific locations when not in use can be steps on the student’s schedule. In our experience, more than one young employee has stated, “I could not do this job without my schedule!”