TEMPER TANTRUMS- AUTISM

Hello everybody, itsmy pleasure to be back with this important topic. True and very true……

“My pain may be the reason for somebody’s laugh

But my laugh must never be the reason for somebody’s pain”

Charlie Chaplin

thanx to www.belasbrightideas.wordpress.com

Oh no temper tantrums are very scary, painful and stressful for you as well as for your child. Why tantrums in our children with ASD and other related disabilities? Temper tantrum is the physical manifestation of the turmoil that the child experiencing with in him. Most of the times temper tantrums are the result of: 1) deficit in communication 2) learnt behavior to fulfill his/her needs 3) avoiding tasks the he/she does not like 4) internal issues like accumulated stress or illness 5) academic pressure 6) undue pressure or over demands on the child 7) parents reaction 8) lack of sleep9) fatigue 10) temperament of the child 11) changes in the routine 12) over stimulation and sensory issues.13) unable to take “no” from the people. Reason for the tantrum could be anything but working and redirecting your child during the episode is highly challenging. Some children tend to have more tantrums than the other children, he/she is frustrated, overwhelmed and is possibly experiencing a lot of tension or emotions which he/she unable to handle and it explodes as a big tantrum. It’s not that your child want to irritate you purposefully with his behavior basically he does not know how to deal with the internal and external stress with in him.

The nature of the tantrum:

Temper tantrums are exhibited by the child to seek attention from parents, caregivers (by the immediate external environment).  Child looks around often to seek your attention, the moment you react to the child the intensity of the behavior increases. Always remember temper tantrums are goal oriented behaviors as soon as the goal is met or child gets what he wanted the behavior diminishes. Child seems to be inconsolable during tantrum. Most of the episodes last long time some of them are short ones, the duration of the tantrum increases and decreases depends upon the reaction you provide to the child. The child tends to be very aggressive such as hitting, biting (injurious to others), harms himself (self injurious behavior) and damages the environment by throwing and breaking things. Our children are very smart they throw tantrums with the people who reacts to their behavior and in the environment where his/her behavior is been reinforced.   If the tantrums lasts more than an hour, child find great difficulty in settling himself and the behavior is too dangerous to the environment it is better to seek medical attention.

Managing temper tantrums and teaching alternative ways to express child’s displeasure:

ü  Always pay attention to the antecedents or the triggers which are the reason for the explosion or escalation of the behavior.

ü  It is a good way to control antecedents rather than working on consequences. Keep him informed about changes happen in the routine in order to escape from a big tantrum. As we learnt time and time again preparation to a change always works.

ü  Never say “no” instead tell him what he is expected to do or perform, if at all you have to use no it is good to go with “no thank you” followed by what he has to do ex: quite hands, walking feet.

ü  Redirecting the child before the tantrum (if you expect the behavior), you can avoid the small melt down turning in to a full blown tantrum.

ü  Safety of your child and you are important during tantrum, restructuring the environment is very important to avoid accidents.

ü   If the child is exhibiting injurious behavior its ok to use physical restraint (holding his hands in the back, the proper procedure has to be learnt from the therapist before execution) to control his/her aggression.

ü  Planned ignoring:  the total focus of this technique is “consistently (whenever, wherever) not providing attention to the child throughout the entire episode”. The ignoring has to be practiced by everybody related to the child. All it needs is total commitment by everybody not even negative attention is encouraged by you.  You should act as if your child does not exist in that situation and totally avoid eye contact but at the same time keep a watch on him.  Don’t negotiate with your child during the tantrum.  Praise your child high when he shows desirable behavior during the episode. If your child is middle of some activity continue to make him complete the task at the same time you still practice to ignore the tantrum. You try to engage yourself in an activity, do an activity which create interest to your child or play music of your child interest.  Once the tantrum stopped wait for the right opportunity (whenever he shows a positive behavior) to praise your child. Never discuss about the nature of the tantrum to your child and do not provide the item which he was demanding. And the item should be give for the immediate desirable behavior.

ü  The behaviors which are there in your child for a long time takes long duration to deescalate but never give up your approach.

ü  Initially parents strictly follow the strategy of planned ignoring as the time goes on, parents get angry too and begin to pay negative attention, punish and yell at the child. This inconsistent practice strengthens the behavior instead of weakening. You should not ignore your child for a while you must always ignore in all situations.

ü  Remember never give in things he is demanding during tantrum.

ü  You can intervene when your child damaging the property and self injurious behaviors are present, take away the things he is damaging, restraint him not hurting himself and others but you still continue to ignore him by avoiding eye contact and not talking.

ü  Work on communication and encourage him to use words (I need help no thank you) or other alternative way to express his displeasure instead of a tantrum.

ü  Sometimes tantrums could be purely  a sensory issue the detailed analysis is needed before the intervention

ü  Parents should remain calm and patient as you know it is neither your fault nor your child’s.

Tantrum is the fastest way to show your child’s displeasure to you, and tantrums get children what they want. You know why your child show tantrums most of the time it works!!!!! Be empathetic to your child’s state of mind as you know he did not intentionally set out to ruin your day.  I know it’s very hard to put up with tantrum and your patience is the success mantra. All is wellJJJ

Take care

MY WORLD OF COLORS-AUTISM

Hi good see you after a long long break!!!!! Hmm its really long gap right, but back of my mind the thoughts  of my blog are really haunting. The guilt of not posting  is really killing me, so today I decided to post…. So here I amJJJJ

                “Once you choose hope

          Everything is possible”

thanx to www.123rf.com for the above picture

I still wonder how I acquired the concept of colors. I am sure I did not take much of my teacher’s time did you? But most of our children find this concept very difficult and they struggle hard to generalize. “Color” is an abstract concept, because this does not have a shape or size. It is not a figurative concept.  You can see colors everywhere; I think most of us learn colors by association.  Autistic children show great fascination and interest towards shapes, numbers and alphabets in the very early age (by 2 years itself).  The understanding and identification of shape, alphabets and number concepts are easy for them because these concepts are concrete and easy to form a reference.  The children who have had a struggle in achieving colors might surely have problems with language.  Even the components in language are abstract, except nouns (which have reference) all the other parts of language is abstract.  The difficulty of understanding colors can be an alarm sign or indication for you to give great focus in your child’s language development.  I know one child who took very long time to learn colors but one fine day he amazed by naming almost all the colors we introduced to him, I think it’s a matter of time all they need is consistent approach in teaching them. children with pure developmental delay(DD) surely buy extra time to acheive color concept, it is very mych understandable. So let us look in to the ways or strategies to teach color concept.

Strategies:

v  Teach one color at a time; introduce the selected color along with another b color of your choice hence this helps for discrimination.

v  Take one object or select one shape to teach all the colors ( ex: a ball can be selected to teach all the colors like red color ball, yellow color ball etc, selecting different objects  creates confusion.   

v  Color flash cards using one shape are a good idea. Ex; the flash cards can be a shape of square, circle or rectangle, not one color in one shape

v  Initially select primary colors( red, blue, green and yellow) once he masters these concentrate on secondary colors

v  Before introducing the color concept, talk about it to your child by saying we are going to work on so and so color otherwise his/her focus is going to be on the object you selected to teach the color

v  Do not combine two concepts at a time( ex; this is a big red ball, here you r talking about color as well as the shape, this misleads the child)

v  The selected object to teach colors should be familiar to the child

v  The teaching steps include matching , sorting, identification and naming colors

v  For hyperlexic( who are good in reading) children writing down the name of the color will surely do the magic. On the red ball you can print the name red

v  Teaching discrimination between colors is easier if the two colors are used in the beginning. Too much of information or stimuli confuses the child

v  Select contrast colors for discrimination or identification( it is easier to discriminate between red and green instead of red and orange)

v  Once he masters identifying the colors introduce them in cluster

v  When you selected to teach particular color to the child encourage your child to wear the same color dress and you can wear the same color and you can talk about it, so he/she gets more opportunity to experience the concept

v  Give plenty of opportunities to generalize the learnt concept  in a natural environment

v  Give references for each color like the color of the apple is red, milk is white and leaf is green. When you are talking about them have the object as a concrete cue. This association is of a great help

v  Encourage your child to do painting of the selected color and collage will help him to register

v  Once he masters primary colors you can teach him patterns( like red and yellow make orange ) to create secondary colors

v  Make him wear wrist bands of the selected color , I am sure it helps in registration

v  Play turn taking games for matching and sorting colors , this gives an extra kick to your child

v  Use Lego sets and color blocks to build themes with  the same color

v  Expect him/her to show at least 90% accuracy in one color before you proceed to a different one 

v  Encourage your child to use the concept of colors in his language ex: mama give red spoon 

v  Further  strengthening the learnt concept you can practice by giving choice in daily life ( ex; do you want to wear your red shirt or the blue one)

v  You can sing songs on colors for creating interest to your child ex; color color what color do you choose song

v  Discrimination teaching is the best way to teach colors

v  Encourage your child to collect stuff on colors and create a folder for future reference

v  Don’t forget to reinforce your child at each successful  approximation

Despite of the difficulty in understanding abstract concept, teaching our amazing autism is still possible using techniques that are sure to work. When it comes to teaching children with autism, hard is really an understatement.  You guys really jump out your skin each time you work on a concept with your child, I mean it’s not a cake walk.  Teaching color concept is another challenging task for you, all it needs is your creativity and systematic approach. Let us join hands to create a colorful world to our amazing talents. Each one is a greatest rainbow!!!!