TEACHING GAME PLAY CONCEPTS

A BIG HELLO FROM ME AGAIN…….. SO CHEER UP, LET’S HAVE SOME FUN

We get fun by playing games; I mean any form indoor or outdoor, but why not the same for our children with autism and other related disabilities.

So let’s focus on teaching game play concepts:

When teaching students with autism to play games, some may be unfamiliar with game play concepts or rules; ex, rolling dice, moving pieces on the game board, and taking turns. These skills can be taught in separate or in discrete trail setting (Take up as a goal and work on in a therapeutic setting). The selected concepts should be practiced with other peers and siblings. Variety of visual strategies has to be incorporated to teach game play skills.

STRATEGIES:

1.  Priming- preparing students ahead of time by practicing game play skills in isolation.

2.  Select one game at a time- for ex, if you are working on snake and ladder consider to work on things like , rolling dice, choosing a game piece, moving the game piece while counting to different members, identifying numbers found in dice, also practice taking turn by passing an object back and forth while saying… moms turn my turn.

3. Teach one step at a time- find out steps in a game; consider teaching one step at a time.

4. Simple to complex- start with two people and then proceed to more people.

5.  Small steps- after practicing the game play concepts in isolation ->put them in use, start with simple game for short time( look @ child’s attention also).

6.  Make it fun- you can make game fun by incorporating child’s interests in to the game (include child’s favorite characters like Dora, Barney etc).

7.  Motivation- praise and reward the child, to make the game motivating for the child.

8.  Use visuals-since our children are visual learners use visual aids to facilitate the play, use visual cues to understand whose turn it is.

9.  Play with peers and siblings-once he masters the game play skills, it is important to practice them in natural setting. Encourage the child to play with his siblings and peers.

10. Social stories- are one best strategy to encourage proper play behavior and manners while playing with peers.

11. Modelling-proven to give best results for understanding rules and play behavior, the model selected to demonstrate the steps clearly in front of the child

so get  GOING......                                                                                                                                   

BEAUTIFUL QUOTES

HI, HELLO……..JOIN ME FOR SUCCESS….. I AM SURE IT WORKS!!!!!!

Simple yet worth to remember and practice:

-Effective way to reduce problem behavior is strengthen positive behavior with reinforcement rather than try to weaken undesirable behaviors by using aversive or negative response.

-If you are patient in one moment of anger with your child, you will escape a hundred days of sorrow.

-Virtually all children in the course of a day, “will do” or say something that is worth reinforcing.

-Unfortunately we tend to focus attention on what is wrong of a child, not what is right.

-Children never outgrow the need for positive praise.

-A disciplined child is a product of disciplined environment. (So guys… structure please)

-Reinforcing appropriate behavior is absolutely the best way to go.

-When ever your child has a bad day think “today is not forever”.

--Nothing is more inequitable than the equal treatment of unequal’s.

-Don’t judge, sermonize, moralize, instruct, reason, or advise-“just talk” to your child.

-Treatment (strategies) should be equal to the problem.

-Whenever children misbehave doesn’t respond - ignore( I mean complete extinction)

-Parents tend to give in before their kids give out. (Help them to work on self regulation)

-Give treatment time to work.

-When children deserve our love the least, they need it the most.

-Not only does hugging feel good àits good for your child (research says it reduces stress)

-Control is not a necessarily a dirty word though management is better. (I am controlling my child’s behavior instead I am managing his behavior)

-Redirect the child attention to overcome a tantrum or a bad fit.

Finally “The first half of our life is controlled by our parents, the second half is controlled by our children”.

Don't  you  think so…………JJJJJJJJJ

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.  

REAL INSIGHT

HI
Watch the video clip downloaded from the youtube, the presentation done  by Dr.TEMPLE GRANDIN who herself has autism
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2wt1IY3ffoU&feature=related


Enjoy, take care

COPING WITH PLAY GROUND

Hi

Sorry I did not post any article yesterday because I was busy playing………… wow  awesome play  and play ground “means a lot”  to  most of the kids, ooh la la la but  it’s not the same for children with autism. Yesterday I went for walk in the park, all I could see was kids kids  kids playing out joy , I m sure when they play they forget the entire world. Am I right?

Play in simple words- “it is a  sensory motor delight”

The playground can be really threatening environment to a child with autism. There is no structure or routine to recess and lunch time.  As we know Children with autism love routine, so they often feel stressed or anxious during this time. So called normal children or normally-developing children use play time to release stress and just enjoys that break time; but our beloved kids accumulate stress during this period.  In the playground, there is a lot of free movement, noise, and vast open space. There are unwritten rules that must be adhered to. There are many sights, sounds and smells to deal with. These often cause stress and anxiety (sensory over load).

Most of our children lack imaginative and creative play skills; he is comfortable in solitary play and doing repetitive pursuits such as playing the same puzzles again and again and playing computer games. This will not allow him to mingle with other children and puts him at a disadvantage socially. One more important aspect we should not over look is, the child will be vulnerable to teasing and bullying, both physically and verbal, during recess and lunch time. His unusual behavior and poor social skills make him stands out as an easy target. Lack of assertiveness and coping mechanism to deal with this situation, may result in anger outbursts in class sometime after the event. It is often difficult to the child to express the feeling of distress to an adult because of poor language reciprocity and poor social skills .  We have to look in to very important aspects- child’s poor motor co-ordination skills  will be painfully obvious to all, while other children play ball games, the child with autism avoid playing because of poor co-ordination and motor skills , attempts to join him to ball games lead to  disaster ..….. Added to that their attention where the child unable to concentrate or focus on the activity. The child may not know the boundaries (where to play, what is safe zone etc) of play ground, as we know some children with autism are “wanderers” who have little sense of personal danger and no understanding of school boundaries.

I am very much pleased to accept that the child may need to be on his own at times, but provide support should the child wish to join social activities.

STRATEGIES

  So what should we doing to make it right…..and pleasurable to our pals

-Tell them or prepare the child for the playground by showing visual cues

-Reading social stories and helping the child to cope with  play ground, reading story has to be done before taking to playground.

-Encourage the child to learn by watching others play, if the child has integration aide in the school  it would be helpful to assign some aide time supervising and supporting the child in the play ground.

-Talk through the activities and his role during group play( when he has take turn and when to share turn etc)

-Train him/her in co-ordination skills that way he will not be out of sync child in the play ground
-Mark a school map with boundaries and no-go areas to ensure the child clearly understands where he can and cannot go.

-Prepare child by telling him to turn for help or support when he is distressed in the playground  he can come to his aide or teacher by saying I am done with play I need to rest for some time)

-Initially the child can go for pre arranged area of play ground with the help of aide, gradually encourage him to actual play

-Specify break times; if possible allow the child access to the computer and to favorite activities, this provides as a reinforcement.

-Make a picture schedule of activities. One hour of unstructured activity seems to be great stress to our child, spilt the hour in to segments: 20minutes –ball games 15m-break and computer time another 25minutes- other activities

-Allow the child 10 minutes of time out after returning from recess. Give him favorite activity, time at his special interest or listening to music.

-Choose a mature child from the class to act as a buddy during recess and lunch time

-Using business card holder the child can keep in his pocket with ideas for conversation starters, activities to try, etc

-Encourage the child whenever he goes to playground without jerks by giving positive reinforcement

-Teach some opening lines to help the child join in conversations like.. Good evening what game r v playing today etc

THAT’S ALL BUDDIES; LET’S TAKE A DEEP BREATH…..  GET READY TO PROVIDE PLEASURABLE EXPERIENCE TO OUR NAUGHTYS, WEAR SHOES AND RUN TO PLAY GROUND. OH YAH NOW ,IT’S TOTAL FUN,ROCK IT.

CREATION OF VISUAL TOOLS

CREATION OF VISUAL TOOLS AND SCHEDULES  FOR EFFECTIVE COMMUNICATION

Hello folks here is a visual delight

Visual tools and schedules give information on

Ø  What is going to happen?

Ø  When something is going to happen?

Ø  What are the choices?

Ø  What is changing from the routine/schedule?

Ø  Who is coming?

Ø  What are you suppose to do?

Ø  What is happening that is new or/ different?

Ø  What are the sequences of events? and very important aspect of visual tools are , helps us in establishing "rules" they tell us what to do, what not to do , define rewards, and define consequences

In creating visual tools-

• use what the child understands quickly and easily,
• create tools that are universally understood ( for ex. traffic signs)
• keep it very simple
• flexibility in making visual tools according to needs of the child( for ex. a hyperlexic child process pictures better when you combine with words)
• the size of visuals should be handy and easy to work with
• the accessibility of visuals is very important, there should be hands on practice where the child goes and interact with them for understanding the structure and routine
• portability of visuals is key to success
• observe how the child responding to the tools you created
• implement them consistently and present  visual tools in all situations
• fading the visual tools for independency

Setting up visuals:

1. Store near the door, you don’t need to use visual in every part of the day , may be you consider to use them in certain part of the day( like when you work with him in one and one session)
2.  use according to relevancy( the waiting symbol to be shown to the child whenever he has hard time to wait for his turn)
3. want to stress again the accessibility of visuals or schedules are key to independency
4. The organization of visuals: The number of symbols and how they are arranged, whether it’s horizontal or vertical does not matter as long as the child understands. There are lots of ways to set up visuals up, most ones used by using board maker, and most of them using Velcro and blue tag. You can use real pictures, laminated pictures if the child needs to interact often with particular visual, sometimes simple photocopy ones and line drawings are some sort of help. you can use base for visuals cards with Velcro and blue tac, hard board, carpet piece, small folders, files, retractable devices,  badges,  and diaries etc

 



Implementation of visual strategies- Setting up implementing and using these visual strategies is the most important thing, the aim of using visual strategies not to be with the child for using visuals all the time but making the use them independently or on their own. Yes we set them up and we work with them to start with and to help them use these visual strategies, the idea is eventually guide them to understand the sequence of activities. The aim of visual schedule - children always not going to have adult showing them what to do instead gradually they should become independent. one more important aspect could be involving children in setting up visual schedule rather than following what is already in there  and demonstrating modeling how to use the

Specify children how to use the visual schedule by

-point out to children

-involving children in setting up schedule

-talk through the process, how to carry a schedule

-demonstrate and model how to use

-increase independent use

 Here guys I am pleased to share some models with you...

The above visual schedule clearly represents what to expect from the kid or in other words what the child expected to do. The schedule is not over crowded and illustrated with numerals for understanding the sequence. The child has easy accessibility to schedule and the pictures are simple and portable to handle. This format can be used as a individual or group schedule.

This is a simple visual representation for a child who has hard time waiting, this helps to understand, he needs to keep his hands quiet or in simple words" hands to yourself"

This is an interactive visual tool, where the child selects the weather cards by looking at the weather outside.

The visual schedule above represents the Circle time- and the sequence of activities the child going to do in circle time like London bridge is falling down, followed by sing a song and ringa ringa roses.

The above visual representation helps the child understand transition (first you wash hands and then eating, helps to anticipate consequences.)

The above visual schedule helps the child to understand the sequence of activities done in the school; you can make the child circle on the activity visual. You can use this as a choice board  in selecting activities. It can be used as self monitoring board also. It gives brief description to the parent about CHILDS classroom schedule.

 This is same as the above visual schedule, where the child allowed monitoring his schedule at home. The last two schedules helps to increase teacher and parent communication. 

Remember using visual tool is not a goal it is a teaching strategy ( I mean use visual strategies as a resource for communication independency)

Thank you

See you soon on another topic, take care

VISUAL COMMUNICATION- AUTISM

HI
I  have  a  very strong passion towards this topic, let me share with you, see for thinking about visual communication and AUTISM  gives me endless joy so let’s move on...........


Visual strategies to improve communication in children
With autism


AUTISM-In other words "A social/communication
disability”. Our children experience obstacles like,
 HOW DO I COMMUNICATE WITH OTHERES (EXPRESSION)? And
 DO I UNDERSTAND WHAT IS BEING SAID TO ME
(COMPREHENSION OR RECEPTION)?


We always know and remember-Communication is not just
Speech


PROCESS OF COMMUNICATION
-Establishing or shifting attention
-following rapidly changing stimuli (figure ground discrimination, what I mean is paying attention to important part of conversation by minimizing attention to other stimuli)
-taking in information
-processing information
-storing information (in short term and long term
Memory)
-retrieving information (when needed)
-sending information (execution or output as a form of
expression). Communication is not alone words, it has many forms like
Pointing, signlanguage, gestures, bodylanguage, pictures,objects,writtenlanguage,byexibtingbehaviors’
(tantrums, self injurious, injurious to others etc)


FUNCTIONS OF COMMUNICATION
( Request, Asking questions, Answering questions, comment, social interaction, labeling, greet)
PRAGMATICS-the "glue" that makes communication effective which is always difficult for our terrific kids, pragmatics include
1 attention 2 eye contact 3 responding to initiation of others 4 turn taking in communication  5 conversational skills which are starting, stopping and maintaining the topic, 6  responding and using non verbal behaviors’  /gestures/body language.


".....the normal communication message is 55% visual-gestures, facial expression, body language, objects in the environment 38% vocal-intonation ,rate, volume 7%verbal"-the actual words that are spoken
 Why do we use visual information with children in
that matter with anybody?
 1 Visual information is non-transient. 2 it provides additional time to focus on the message, process it and formulate a response.3 it provides a concrete reference can be re-visited as often as needed visual strategies be used to:4 .increase  independence. 5 Teach new skills. 6 provide range of choices-either broadens or limit.7 improves effective communication. 8 indicate when something is not avilable.9 provide greater structure and predictability. 10 give information about what is next. 9 clarify when something has finished. 10 help for transitions. 11. Inform changes, all these things can cause anxiety in children even with adults also most of us use and developed extensive variety of visual strategies in organizing our lives , to learn new skills and to remember information
( ex; calendars, menu, time tables, maps, diaries, traffic signs, shopping lists, do to lists, recipes)

MOST OF OUR CHILDREN UNDERSTANDS ROUTINE LANGUAGE,GESTURES,LEARNEDROUTINES,ENVIRONMENTAL SUPPORTS,COMMUNICATION SUPPORT
 It does not matter if students are verbal or nonverbal, the majority of them are visual learners ( I hear I forget, I see and I understand) So What sort of visuals we use with our children. Time tables and schedules- child’s routine is displayed in visual format could be pictures or words, most of the time displayed in horizontal and vertical way. I suggest you to go for horizontal way which helps the child to practice left to right scanning essential for reading and writing, and really does not matter which way as far your child comfortable is with. It should help her/him for organization and independence
.Choice boards
.First and then boards
.Its time to do......boards (transition boards)
.Task analysis boards
.Rules and expectation boards
.Behavior rules (wait cards, happy face, calm and quiet card)
.The real photographs
.The symbols
.giving visual cues for following verbal directions (showing left arrow mark for left side, showing a picture of a boy sitting in a chair for on sitting)
.Group activities -showing a circle for the indication of circle time activities and showing a picture of slide for outdoor activity.
 .Verbal expressions- working through with children who have difficulty managing emotions can be communicated with expression cues


 That’s all guys


 I WILL DISCUSS ON HOW TO USE   VISUAL SYMBOLS AND STRATEGIES IN THE NEXT POST