Using Coping Skills Effectively
July 2, 2026

The Challenge

You and your partner are in a fight and as your stress levels rise, they say the one thing that is sure to send you over the edge—calm down.



We all know that phrase never ends well, but why is that? Beyond even just the negative implications, when your nervous system is in that heated of a moment, you need more than just an added demand of calm down to bring yourself back to a state of equilibrium. Kids are much the same. When your ASD kiddo is dysregulated, throwing in a random breathing exercise may do much the same thing as being told to calm down. This needs to be more of a methodical and guided practice. So where can we start?



The Solution

Model coping skills yourself. If your child has never seen the coping skill you’re asking them to do done by anyone else, they may not understand its purpose. Modeling it yourself BEFORE dysregulation incidents can help get your kiddo familiar.

Practice coping skills before. If they’ve never tried the coping skill themselves, learning it during a hard moment will likely add to the frustration. Practicing beforehand in good, or even slightly tense times can show the kiddo that this isn’t something solely thrown into the mix to stop them from being disruptive.


Visuals. Work together before hand to create visuals of how they can handle their stress. This could be counting, breathing, squishing something, jumping, or whatever else your kiddo likes to do. Practice using and modeling it so that in a moment of big feelings, you can present the board. This will allow them the autonomy to pick, while adding the least amount of pressure possible.

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What is it? NET is one of the main ways that children practice and learn social, emotional and behavioral skills in ABA Therapy. As the name suggests, this style of teaching leans into the natural environment, utilizing play sessions to teach a child how to safely interact, communicate, and regulate. How does this work? How it Works During an NET session, the client comes into contact with many different toys, people, choices and interactions. All of these can be utilized in a fun and engaging way to naturally expand and test a child’s abilities. NET also allows the client opportunity to choose what to play with, building confidence and rapport with those around them. This allows the skills taught during ABA to become more relevant to the child’s life and easier to generalize into their daily routine. NET can also encourage a child to WANT to learn more, being that what they are learning highly relates to activities and people that they prefer to engage with. When it Shines NET is often paired with structured learning as well. This is sometimes referred to as “DTT” or “Table Time.” During these sessions, a child learns how to perform tasks such as labeling items/people, answering questions, following simple directions or imitating gross motor movements in a structured environment. These skills are then naturally brought up during NET. For example, let’s say a child learns the word “apple” during Table Time. Then, in a play session using the play kitchen, the child interacts with a toy apple. The therapist may make use of this, bringing the apple into play. By utilizing these two forms together, the child gets a vary well rounded session.
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