Incidental Teaching

Description of the Strategy

Incidental teaching is a systematic protocol of instruction that is delivered in natural environments. Although the procedures may resemble “motherese,” or traditional conversation between a caregiver and child, there is actually very little that is incidental about incidental teaching. Most often, incidental teaching is used to teach or expand language skills in the course of everyday situations. The major advantage of incidental teaching is improved generalization of skills from the teaching setting to use in everyday life.

An incidental teaching environment contains items, activities, or other topics of interest to the learner, but the teacher controls access to the student's interests. By providing instruction in the environment where the new response will later be needed, the student learns to ...