Helpful approaches
Found 47 listings
Winning a Blue Peter competition – Naomi’s story
Hi, I’m Naomi (age 12), I have PDA and I recently won a Blue Peter (BP) competition!
The whole filming experience was pretty overwhelming but also gave me some amazing and life-long memories. I think PDAers find it really difficult to experience and try new things as we usually try to [...]
PDA best practice – the professional voice
PDA best practice - what the professionals would like you to know
24 professionals from a range of backgrounds explain why they feel it's important to identify PDA and share their tips for best practice.
This is one of two videos created for PDA Day 2021 that share best practice about [...]
PDA best practice – the PDA community’s voice
PDA best practice - what the PDA community would like professionals to know
This is one of two videos created for PDA Day 2021 that share best practice about PDA for professionals from all sectors – including healthcare, education, social care, the law, therapists, counsellors, advocates and policy makers.
This video [...]
The Great Minds Podcast: PDA Society
PDA Society trustees Paula Webb & Vikki Threlfall chat with Emma and Meg from Great Minds Together about lots of topics including terminology around PDA, helpful approaches, differences between ODD & PDA, EHCPs, working with professionals and more.
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PDA in the Therapy Room
PDA in the Therapy Room: A Clinician's Guide to Working with Children with Pathological Demand Avoidance.
This guide sets out the most effective strategies for clinicians to provide the best care for children with PDA, adapting conventional modes of therapy to suit their needs. Methods include indirect techniques such as [...]
Introduction to PDA (2021)
An introductory video about PDA (Pathological Demand Avoidance).
This video is just over 20 minutes long and covers lots of information, including:
What is demand avoidance?
PDA & Autism
Key features of a PDA profile
Research & clinical themes
Why identify PDA?
How PDA can feel
What are demands?
Demand [...]
What is PDA? video
This short video gives a quick introduction to PDA and was created to help raise awareness of PDA with the general public and convey some essential information about PDA in a quick and easily shareable format.
Voiced by a wonderful group of PDAers and PDA Society team members.
Published by: PDA [...]
What is PDA? booklet
This booklet is designed to be an introductory guide to the Pathological Demand Avoidance profile of autism for individuals, families and professionals.
The booklet covers an overview of PDA, how PDA can feel, an insight into what demands are and how they’re avoided, info about identifying PDA, helpful approaches and [...]
Strategies case study
Helping your child with PDA to play: eight strategies for supporting a child with Pathological Demand Avoidance Syndrome at home
This paper describes a case study of a young boy and the strategies that enabled him to learn skills while playing with others and developing positive relationships.
The eight strategies described [...]
PDA tools and resources – tes online
The following PDA-related resources are available to purchase or download for free from www.tes.com ...
Managing Demand Avoidance Toolkit
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The Demand Avoidance Toolkit, is an adapted framework of collaborative approaches used in education to teach pupils with PDA (Pathological Demand Avoidance). This pack works alongside the Zones of Regulation [...]
Support for siblings
It can be tricky to balance the needs of individual children within any family, and this can be even trickier in PDA households.
Our Siblings page offers advice around strategies and tips for supporting siblings.
A parent to a PDA child has also written two very helpful documents: a Q&A for [...]
Helpful approaches infographic: PANDA strategies
This infographic illustrates the key strategies which are helpful in working with and understanding someone with a PDA profile of autism.
Conventional support strategies, including those often recommended for ASD, are often ineffective and counter-productive with a PDA profile of autism.
In place of structure, routine, firm boundaries, praise, rewards/consequences, is [...]
Keys to care
A single page information sheet for supporting and helping someone with a PDA profile. Ideal for those working with individuals whose care-needs have been identified as relating to demand avoidance. Useful as a grab-sheet for members of staff - a regular reminder of what can help.
Also helpful for family [...]
AET National Autism Standards
This extensive paper entitled 'The Distinctive Clinical and Educational Needs of Children with Pathological Demand Avoidance Syndrome: Guidelines for Good Practice' was written by Phil Christie and originally published in the Good Autism Practice Journal. It is reprinted by the Autism Education Trust (AET) to accompany their National Autism [...]
Tim’s Top Tips: ideas for adults
Tim Collins is an adult who was recently diagnosed with PDA. Along with sharing his story with us (please see his case study) he has kindly created a list of Top Tips designed to help adults navigate their way through life.
Daily life
Keep a notepad and pencil handy at [...]
Self-help, coping strategies and therapies for adult PDAers
Here we have included a downloadable PDF version of the Self-help, coping strategies and therapies for adult PDAers page, found in the Adult Life section.
It includes suggestions for self-help, coping strategies and therapies which were assembled from a variety of first-hand accounts shared by adults, diagnosed or self-identifying as [...]
Mind Map for schools
This 'Mind Map' is a useful resource for teachers, and anyone involved in providing support to a young person.
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Good educational practice
Examples of good educational practice for PDA pupils
These extracts showing good practice in education for pupils with a PDA Profile are shared with kind permission from the authors of these two books:
Fidler, R. and Christie, P. (2019) Collaborative Approaches to Learning for Pupils with PDA: Strategies for Education [...]
Bill Nason’s PDA insights
Bill Nason is a mental health professional with a masters degree in clinical psychology and more than 30 years of experience in treating individuals with developmental disabilities.
He regularly shares helpful posts relating to PDA on his autism discussion page on Facebook:
Anxiety, Opposition and Demand Avoidance
The Anxiety of [...]
Super Shamlal – Living and Learning with Pathological Demand Avoidance
This illustrated storybook is aimed at children aged 7-11 to help them recognise the features of PDA, and develop tools to support them. A helpful introduction for parents and carers explains how it feels to live with PDA, and the appendices at the back provide useful strategies to be [...]
Coping with Christmas
A description of approaches that can be helpful for managing Christmas and other family celebrations.
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Child Behaviour & Parenting Strategies
The Child Behaviour and Parenting Strategies study was designed to investigate links between child behaviour and parenting strategies, as well as many other factors, with a particular focus on children with developmental disabilities such as autism spectrum disorder (ASD).
This is an update on preliminary findings from the study, which [...]
Understanding PDA – Part 2
A two-part webinar conducted live in March 2017 and now available here. The webinar was primarily designed for parents and carers of PDA children or who feel that PDA may be the best ‘fit’ for their child’s profile, but may also be helpful for professionals (medical, education, social care) [...]
PDA and Family Resilience
In this webinar, Laura Kerbey and Angela Kelly from Positive Autism Support & Training look at the impact of PDA on the family as a whole and strategies for building resilience.
An extended question and answer session follows.
Recorded in September 2017
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Education Support and Strategies
In this PDA Society webinar Phil Christie and Ruth Fidler from Autism Associates provide an overview of the education and support needs of children with the PDA profile.
They outline how some of the strategies that are typically found to be effective for autistic children and young people (such as [...]
Demand Avoidance of the PDA Kind
This video was created to help raise awareness of how the PDA profile of autism can present, combining experiences kindly shared by children, young people and adults.
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Child Profiles
Child profiles or ‘one-page profiles’ have been developed as a useful tool particularly for SENCos to use in schools in order to share information about the needs and capabilities of a range of pupils with additional needs across the staff. This can help staff to ensure their practice is [...]
Collaborative Approaches to Learning for Pupils with PDA
Strategies for Education Professionals
This book distils expert advice on implementing collaborative approaches to learning for supporting pupils with Pathological Demand Avoidance Syndrome (PDA) at school. Explaining why this approach is so beneficial, it presents key information, advice and resources to help education professionals best support pupils with PDA, and [...]
Understanding Pathological Demand Avoidance Syndrome in Children
A Guide for Parents, Teachers and Other Professionals
The first book ever written about PDA - it gives a comprehensive overview for everyone with an interest in the subject. It was written collaboratively by professionals and parents.
This straightforward guide offers a complete overview of Pathological Demand Avoidance Syndrome (PDA) and [...]
Can I tell you about Pathological Demand Avoidance syndrome?
Can I tell you about Pathological Demand Avoidance syndrome?: A guide for friends, family and professionals
Meet Issy – an 11-year-old girl with pathological demand avoidance syndrome (PDA), a condition on the autism spectrum. Issy invites readers to learn about PDA from her perspective, helping them to understand how simple, [...]