As children move into later childhood and the teen years, independence goals naturally expand beyond self-care into the broader skills needed to navigate the world more independently. Money and community skills are a significant part of that expansion.
Why These Skills Matter So Much
Money management and community navigation skills directly affect a young person's ability to participate independently in adult life — shopping, managing a budget, using public spaces safely and appropriately, and eventually, for many, working and living more independently. Building these skills deliberately, well before they're urgently needed, tends to produce stronger outcomes than waiting until independence is suddenly expected.
Money Skills Worth Building
Depending on your child's age and current abilities, money-related goals might include: identifying currency and understanding basic value, counting money and making simple purchases, understanding the concept of budgeting (even simply — this costs more than I have, I need to save for this), and eventually, for older teens, more complex skills like understanding bills, banking basics, or online payment safety.
Community Navigation Skills
Community skills often include: appropriately navigating a store (finding items, waiting in line, interacting with a cashier), using public transportation if relevant to your family's area, understanding and following community rules and social expectations in various settings, and asking for help appropriately when needed in a public setting.
Teaching These Skills Incrementally
Like other daily living skills, money and community skills are typically broken into specific, teachable components — starting with simpler versions (recognizing coins, a supported shopping trip with a short list) and building toward more complex, independent versions over time.
Practicing in Real Community Settings
While some foundational skills can be practiced at home (play money, a mock store setup), genuine community skills ultimately need practice in real community settings — actual stores, actual transactions — ideally with graduated support that fades as independence builds.
Building Confidence Alongside Skill
For many autistic teens and young adults, community settings can be genuinely anxiety-provoking, independent of the specific skill involved. Building confidence and comfort in community settings — through gradual, successful, positive experiences — matters alongside the specific mechanical skills being taught.
Connecting to Safety Skills
Money and community skills connect closely to the safety skills covered in Teaching Safety Skills: Stranger Danger and Home Safety — navigating the community independently requires both the functional skills and the safety awareness to do so appropriately.
Thinking Toward the Future
Money and community skills built during the school years lay important groundwork for the transition-to-adulthood planning covered in Transitioning to Adulthood: Long-Term Independence Planning — starting this work earlier, even in smaller ways, tends to ease that larger transition when it comes.
For Walker-Area Families
Our BCBA, Kimberly Blazer, can build individualized money and community skill goals into your Walker-area child's treatment plan as they get older. Our Individual ABA Therapy service is designed around exactly this kind of goal. our in-home ABA therapy in Walker page has more information, or Get Started Today to get started.
This article is part of our complete guide, Building Independence: A Guide to Daily Living Skills. Clinically reviewed by Kimberly Blazer, BCBA.