TEACHING TIME CONCEPT

HI, Today i am totaly motivated and focused.........result I posted two artcles,keep it up (self praise).


"your birthday is in 10 more sleeps"
As parents, many of us have made comments like this, and we do it becuse time concept is hard for young children to understand. in fact many of us dont realise how hard it could be.  we take much of our understanding of language for granted.
try reading through the following phrases and think about the time frame which they are set. you will find that you can slot them in to past, present,and future quickly....
1.yesterday i went for hair cut
2.I am eating cereals
3.I will go to my grandmothers house this summer
4.My mom was sick
5.I brush my teeth everyday
6.I Climbed the biggest tree on the block
7.I was running for the bus
( these senteces are presented  in past,present and future Right?) so how did u figured out these sentences are in different time frame by seeing the wors like was, yesterday,will, climbing etc, is nt it?its very easy right, not neccesarily
LANGUAGE VERY TRICKY look at this sentence
"last year mom washed our clothes"- it obviously happend in the past because we can find out by seeing the time frame "last year" but did it just happend one single time last year,or did it happend everyday of last year? its tricky to tell. we would need some other words as well as time phrase to understand this:
"last year mom always washed our clothes."
"last year mom washed our clothes once".
Most of us have never needed to think much about tense or time.understanding of time concepts usually debvelops naturally, but if your child has ASD  you should get thinking about them carefully. we know that change can be very difficult for these children so it is important to be able to talk about what is going to happen now, what may have happend in the past,what may happen in the future.
usually children up to three years ,dont think or make sentences by using time frame, they coomunicate mainly in the " here and now".
I remember most of the mothers get panic and do tell me, that their child does not recall what happend in the past for ex, when ask questions like where did you go yesterday with your grand father?  the language meant very little to him/ her when the actual things are not present.when you ask questions like this ,most of the time i see them echoing back or looks confused.
WENDY LAWSON an adult with ASD writes thattime concepts are very tricky for her becuse they are very difficult to visualise. not all part of the language can be visualised, the abstract concepts of time includes yesterday, before ,after,later etc
STRATEGIES:
1.Use more of visual schedules, calanders,clocks, practice him to check his schedule by asking questions like whats next on your schedule? what did you do before eating lunch? the lunch you ate looks delicious etc
2.practice hand gestures -by a sweeping hand over hand sign for alldone, that means he is done with an activity can procede to another. the sign can be anything as far as you use consistently.
3.Stress words that help children locate time frame and teach these explicitly.
words to stress/teach: NEXT, AFTER, BEFORE, NOW, SOON, LATER,IN A WHILE, IN ....FIVE MIN,WILL GO.....MEANS FUTURE,RIGHT NOW, TOMARROW, YESTERDAY, TODAY,LAST NIGHT, THIS YEAR, LAST WEEK,TALKING ABOUT PAST PRESENT, FUTURE.
4. When you communicate with them , talk to them in concrete terms . for ex. " we will go to park soon" instead "we will go to park in five minutes or ater you finished eating snack"
5. Use timers to understand the concept of time, you should finish brushing before the timer beeps
6.Using FIRST AND THEN, like first you finish writing and then computer time
7.RIGHT NOW is a useful concept to model and teach becuse sometimes when your child is demanding something,you may have to say "Not right now...we will doit..."
8.Calenders are used to understand yesterday, today and tomarrow concepts.choose calenders that have a clear box for everyday draw in events thats are in schedule.have blutak that move on everyday.
9.Teach children DAYS OF WEEK, MONTHS, BIRTH DATES etc, teach them getting older by time
10. Encouraging child to maintain diaries
11. practice to make to do lists12.Carry out sequencing activities that promote the use of time phrases.


Taking photos can act as a bridge between the past and present thinking. i encourage my beloved parents to make time as "visual" as possible.