Daily Living and Self-Care Skills
Daily living support teaches the self-care skills that make a child more independent — hygiene, dressing, feeding, and grooming — practiced in the rooms where they actually happen, with your family's own routines and your own supplies.
What this looks like in your home
- Brushing teeth at your sink, with your child's toothbrush.
- Getting dressed in the morning in the order your household actually does it.
- Learning to pour a drink without spilling, at your kitchen table.
- Managing a jacket and shoes before leaving the house.
- Washing hands before dinner without a prompt every time.
Skills we commonly target
- Toothbrushing and hygiene
- Dressing and undressing
- Feeding and utensil use
- Grooming
- Following a multi-step routine independently
How sessions run
Self-care work is scheduled around the routine it belongs to wherever that is possible, so a morning skill can be practiced in the morning and a bedtime skill at bedtime. Sessions are interactive and paced to your child rather than pushed through a checklist. A long routine is usually built one piece at a time, with support gradually reduced as your child takes over more of it.
How progress is measured
Progress is tracked continuously using data collected during sessions. Goals are reviewed and adjusted as your child grows and changes.
Your role
You tell us how your household already does things, and we build around that rather than replacing it. If your family gets dressed before breakfast, that is the routine we teach. Consistency from the adults in the home is what turns a practiced step into something your child does without being asked.
Independence is built in small steps
Most self-care routines are longer than they look. Washing hands is turning on a tap, wetting hands, soap, scrubbing, rinsing, turning off the tap, and drying. Getting ready to leave the house is a coat, a zipper, shoes, and the right order for all three. Breaking a routine into its actual steps makes it possible to see which part your child already has, which part needs support, and where the routine currently stalls.
What families usually notice first is not a single new skill but a morning that takes less effort. Fewer prompts, fewer stalled moments, and a child who does one more piece of the routine on their own than they did last month.
Where these skills connect
Daily living skills sit next to almost everything else in a child’s program. Managing belongings supports the school day, hygiene routines overlap with toileting, and being able to ask for help with a stuck zipper is a communication goal as much as a dressing one. Goals are coordinated across the program so your child is not learning two separate versions of the same routine.
Who delivers it
Sessions are delivered by a Registered Behavior Technician under ongoing supervision from your Board Certified Behavior Analyst, who designs the program, reviews the data, and updates goals.
Related services
Common questions
Why teach self-care skills at home instead of a clinic?
Because these skills belong to specific rooms and specific routines. Brushing teeth happens at your sink with your child's toothbrush, and getting dressed happens in the order your household actually does it. Teaching them where they occur removes the step of transferring a skill from one setting to another.
Which daily living skills do you work on?
Commonly toothbrushing and hygiene, dressing and undressing, feeding and utensil use, grooming, and following a multi-step routine independently. Which ones we start with is decided with you, based on your child's current skills and what would make the biggest difference to your days.
Do we need to buy special equipment or materials?
No. We work with your family's own routines and your own supplies. A skill practiced with your toothbrush, your kitchen table, and your morning schedule is one your child can already use tomorrow.
Who works on these skills with my child?
A Registered Behavior Technician delivers the sessions in your home under ongoing supervision from your Board Certified Behavior Analyst, who designs the program, reviews the data, and updates goals.