PP Here
The Auburn School uses holds that are called therapeutic holds. They sit the child down, or stand behind them, wrap the children's arms around the child, then hold them. The intent is that it makes children with on the spectrum soothed, much like swaddling. For my child, when in a panic, the last thing that is wanted is to be touched, so this always set DC off into a further panic. The most difficult part of this for us was that Auburn had not told us, for about six weeks, when we had brought in a special education consultant, how often and in real time reports to us, what had been happening. They had done no FIP or BIP, they were just doing the same thing over and over again, expecting something new to occur. I don't know if they use this with all the kids. I would assume if the behavior escalates then they would.
The ABA they use is about the zones of regulation and use of a token economy. In my child's classroom the teacher, every two minutes, was prompting the children about what color zone they were in, or what number of regulation they were achieving. The children were rated 1,2, or 3. All 3's was a bad day, all 1's great. My child got obsessively fixated on what numbers he had or hadn't achieved during the day, to the point of distraction from learning.
see this link for a visual:
http://rightresponse.org/training-workshop/physical_intervention