A Comparison of Most-to-Least and Least-to-Most Prompting on the Acquisition of Solitary Play Skills

Two studies are presented in which common prompting procedures were evaluated while teaching children with autism to build Lego® play structures. In the first study, most-to-least (MTL) and least-to-most (LTM) prompting were compared. All participants learned to build the play structures when the teacher used MTL, which was associated with fewer errors than LTM. Nonetheless, three participants learned more quickly with LTM. This finding suggests that MTL may prevent errors, but it sometimes slows learning. The second study compared LTM to MTL without and with a delay (MTLD). MTLD provided an opportunity for the child to independently initiate responding but still minimized the likelihood of errors. Results showed that acquisition was nearly as rapid when the teacher used MTLD as LTM but it produced fewer errors than LTM. Best practice guidelines for choosing prompting procedures are proposed.