Playing, Laughing and Learning with Children on the Autism Spectrum - part 8 ppsx

disabil-Imagination, however, is much more fundamental to ment than simply allowing children to play with a certain type oftoy.. Although this is a natural part of play fornon-autistic c

Creating Imaginative Play Sequences

Dolls’ houses, train sets, toy garages, miniature figures, farm/zoosets, building blocks and a multitude of other children’s toys are alldesigned to stimulate and encourage imagination When we thinkabout imagination we often relate it to fantasy-style daydreaming;

we may even decide that a lack of imagination is not such a ity, allowing focus on the reality of the here and now

disabil-Imagination, however, is much more fundamental to ment than simply allowing children to play with a certain type oftoy As children grow and develop, the imagination becomes anextremely useful social tool It allows us to imagine the thoughtsand feeling of others in reaction to our own behaviour It allows us

develop-to imagine an outcome or a series of possible outcomes develop-to a givensituation so that we can adjust our behaviour and it allows us tofeel empathy and respect for others and these are just the socialbenefits of imagination!

For example:

Jack imagines it would be great to play with Dad’s laptopwhile he’s out of the room He imagines different ways hemight explore it and how exciting this would be He thenimagines his Dad’s reaction to Jack going against his wishes

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Jack imagines what would happen if he broke it and howsad and angry this would make his Dad.

This course of imagination allows Jack to make a considereddecision not to take the risk Using his imagination in this way,Jack could see into the future and imagine a series of possibleoutcomes Using imagination also enables us to achieve goals,fulfil dreams and ambitions – it certainly isn’t simply about con-juring up nice stories or being artistic

A core difficulty for children with autism appears to be theinability to imagine Although this is a natural part of play fornon-autistic children, children with autism are often baffled bysuch play Even though children with autism may never play withnatural fluency, there are ways of encouraging their ability toimagine, which will serve them invaluably in later life

What type of toys?

Choosing the right type of toy to introduce this style of playingtakes a considerable amount of lateral thinking Your child mayalready have an interest in cars or train sets but be playing inappro-priately (lining up, spinning wheels, stacking, organising etc.) It istempting to take these toys as a starting point However, it may bebest to leave teaching your child to play appropriately with theseuntil he is ready to allow you to direct some of his play The objec-tive is not to replace a comforting activity with one which causesconfusion and distress, but to introduce another activity which can

be used as a starting point to help him play appropriately with arange of toys

Remember the following in your choice of toys:

• familiarity

Start off with only one or two elements from whatever toycategory you have chosen to introduce, for example, two or threeplastic animals and one building from a farm set or two dolls and atable (an upturned box), two cups and a teapot Tempting as fullplay sets are, all those pieces can be overwhelming, confusing anddistracting Once your child has mastered one or two items thenyou can introduce more

Realism

Toy manufacturers often try to increase the appeal of their toys bythe use of vivid colours/patterns, adding facial features where youwouldn’t expect to find them (for example, on cars/teapots ) orgive items a ‘cartoon’ feel With non-autistic children includingthose with other special needs these things do indeed increasetheir appeal – they add humour and surprise and stretch eagerimaginations For children with autism it can be confusing to see

an item in real life in one format and then changed beyond nition in a toy replica Vivid colours and lots of detail add to thesensory overload that children with autism are already trying tode-code Try to choose realistic items that look very like what theyintend to represent, i.e real-looking vehicles rather than brightcoloured ones with faces

recog-Over recent years manufacturers have also realized thatchildren also often prefer items that look just like their real coun-terparts and there is now a rising choice of miniature domesticappliances: Hoover washing machines, Dyson vacuums,real-looking kettles/toasters/coffee makers and Bosch powertools For children with autism, they help to close the gap on theimaginative leap by allowing your child to simply imitate youdoing an activity that he understands with an object that he clearlyrecognizes

In summary, choose toys your child can relate to (dolls’ housesand furniture are also a good choice) As well as items he sees in thehome, you may find a set of miniature figures your child knowsfrom the television.

Familiarity

It’s amazing that non-autistic children can pick up a rocket, apirate ship or a castle and simply know how to play appropriately.They can do this because during their short lives they have learntboth directly and incidentally what these things represent – byasking questions, reading stories and looking at pictures they can

conjure up scenarios that they imagine could take place in these

contexts Children with autism do not have the advantage of suchlearning – they learn through direct experience of each situation

in context To explain a concept is not enough, as the child’simpaired imagination cannot take words and conjure up an image

– he needs an actual image.

Because of this, familiarity is highly important if your child isgoing to learn a play sequence with a group of toys Therefore, ifyou decide to use a toy zoo, make sure this is after your child hasbeen familiarized with the concept by looking at pictures/going

on a trip

Make the example as simple and concrete as possible Thinkabout the day – what scenarios (however simple) have youencountered; it might be something like seeing a cat cross the road

or passing a building site Try to refer to events as they happen,describing the scene as you are looking at it in very basic language,for example, ‘cat walking’, ‘digger digging road’ Then use thatsame description whilst you are playing Your child may play backthe scene in his mind and relate this to what you are doing with his

toys You are trying to create a sense of meaning for him by basing his imaginative play on real events Remember the details espe-

cially if they are unusual or amusing If he goes to the park, try atoy playground and figures Find realistic-looking figures andname them, i.e ‘Mummy and Thomas’ etc Re-enact what you’vedone in the park – if Thomas fell over, make the doll fall over!

The right environment

In everyday life, non-autistic people have little difficulty filteringout information they don’t need and processing only the informa-tion relevant to the task It helps us focus on the person talking to

us in a room full of chatting people; it means we are able to read orwrite with the TV on or music in the background We can walkand negotiate our way around objects as well as talking and listen-ing We not only process a vast amount of information coming intoour senses, we also have the ability to unconsciously ignore a greatdeal of superfluous information and block out sensations thatdistract us As I sit here I am vaguely aware of the hum of thecomputer, the hardness of the wooden chair I’m sitting on, trafficnoise outside and the smell of fresh coffee from downstairs;however, none of these sensations are competing with my atten-tion to the screen in front of me – my visual input Now imaginehow difficult it would be to concentrate if you were unable to shutthings out Children with autism often have distractions that wemight only be dimly aware of – itchy clothing, sun pouring inthrough open curtains, the hum of refrigerators, fluorescent lights.Not only might these sensations be annoying and impeding yourchild’s ability to focus on one thing, they may also be unpleasant

to the point of being painful

The reason for creating such a detailed picture of sensory cessing difficulties is to draw your attention to your child in hisenvironment every time you attempt an activity with him Try to

pro-be aware of things that might pro-be problematic for him other thanthe obvious background TV noise Do a brief check of the senses –

check for noise that can be reduced, for light that might be toobright or causing flickering/patterning on the walls, that hisclothing is comfortable and not too heavy (autistic children willoften just pull off clothing that is bothering them), that there are

no strong smells (perfume, coffee, last night’s curry) Once you arehappy that the environment is right, you can begin If you wouldlike to read more about the sensory differences between autistic

and non-autistic processing, try reading Autism and Sensing by

‘picture prompts’ throughout the book, as they are a tried andtested means to help communicate to both verbal andnonverbal children about what is going to happen next.Picture prompts give the child time to mentally prepare for theactivity and shift his focus of attention There is a resource ofpictures at the back of this book for you to copy

J Show your child a picture of an activity that can be used

as a reward afterwards (see Chapter 4’s suggestions forrewards or reinforcers), or use a general ‘take a break’ card(also detailed in Chapter 4)

J Define a specific area to play on – for small toys, try atable top (remove patterned or stark white tablecloths whichmay be too reflective) – pastel green is a good calming colour.You may wish to use a large piece of card (A2-size) with a line

drawn down the centre to show your playing area and your

child’s (again avoid stark white card).

J For larger toys, play on the floor on a plain carpet or rug(or laminate flooring is ideal) If you have a patterned carpet,try using a plain carpet tile

J Start with two sets of figures/animals/cars – one for youand one for your child By having your own set to demonstratehow to play, you are not overwhelming your child withdirections and encroaching on his space It gives you theopportunity to introduce new ideas that he can imitate and tocopy and expand on what he does This doesn’t mean you have

to go out and buy duplicate sets of toys Children’s farm sets,dolls’ furniture, building blocks etc often contain multiples of

the same item Try making additional items in two’s to support

your play, for example, duck ponds can be a piece of oval bluefelt material or card, fields can be green squares and dolls’ bedsand baths can be made from shoe boxes

Building scripts

It perhaps sounds a little theatrical to talk about ‘scripts’, but if this

is the first time your child is learning to play with such toys he’llneed props: stock scenarios that he can fall back on and that helphim make sense of what he’s doing The likelihood is that he’salready building scripts (verbal and/or physical) for all manner ofreal everyday scenarios Occasionally our son will generate a novelway of expressing something but by and large he’ll use collections

of words put together in the same order (learned phrases) that he’sheard before and apply them time and again where he feels they’rerelevant As he gets older his ability to do this gets better and moresophisticated By gathering ‘scripts’ in this way he is learning toproduce the right phrases in response to situations as they arise Inthe early days of learning to play, the same phrases were trotted

out time and again to the same play activity It was unspontaneousand not desperately imaginative, but it paid off; it gave his toysmeaning and enabled him to play, albeit in a limited way.Initially scripts should be very short and unfussy, for example:

‘Mummy and Thomas in park’, ‘Thomas on swing’, ‘Look – adog!’

Gradually work on adding language and new expressions onceyour child understands and repeats the scripts (if he is verbal)

J Support the scripts visually with a large piece of cardwhich tells the play story sequence Use line drawings, photos

or photocopies from books using three or four pictures that tell

a very simple story, for example:

Teddy’s tired and yawning

Teddy puts on pyjamas

Teddy brushes teeth

Teddy goes to bed

Good night, Teddy

Keep your language very simple to start with

Individual Example: Jonathan

Jonathan, aged three, had received a ‘first farm’ play set thatseemed perfect for him; it was a good size and easy for him

to manipulate, the figures were realistic and there was

nothing for him to get frustrated with The problem was hismum simply couldn’t get him to look at it She would set it

up on the floor and Jonathan would simply run through it as

if it wasn’t there When she thought about it, Jonathanhadn’t paid much attention to any of his books with animals

in (though he did like books with pictures of tractors!) Hecould label pig and duck, but his other labels seemed to keepgetting lost and he could only echo what his mum said Jon-athan’s mum decided to look at what related animal activi-ties Jonathan liked He loved sitting in his pushchairlooking at the ducks and the water when they went to thepark, so she decided to take her camera with her on theirnext trip, and whilst they were there she talked about whatwas happening in the form of a very simple story that shecould remember for later

They revisited the park a few times over the week andwhen the photos came back, Jonathan’s mum stuck them on

a piece of card and wrote the story captions underneath Thestory went as follows:

‘One day a baby duck sat under a tree A kind boy threwsome bread to the baby duck All the other ducks rushed toget some, but the little boy gave the biggest piece to the babyduck.’

Jonathan preferred the photos of his real ducks to any ofhis books about farm animals and ducks His mum thenmade up two playing sets, each consisting of:

° two ducks (from the farm set)

° one figure

° a blue felt oval (pond)

° a tree

° pieces of screwed-up tissue paper (bread!)

She placed a large pale green table cloth over the diningroom table (she’d found in the past that Jonathan wouldbecome distracted by the knots in the wood) and set up theplay area as shown below:

Directly opposite Jonathan she placed the photo script(which she had now memorized) Carefully choosing thebest time to play, she held up a picture card (a simple duckoutline on a card) to let Jonathan know it was time to playwith the toy ducks Immediately, Jonathan ran into thekitchen demanding a drink (by dragging her arm to thefridge) – this was one of his usual escape tactics His mumused the opportunity to pick up his drink picture card andpointed to the duck card, saying, ‘play first then drink.’ Thenshe sat at the table and began playing as if for her own

pleasure, without further directing Jonathan to join her Atfirst Jonathan ignored her but when he saw his familiarphoto story go out on the table it drew him closer His mumstarted to tell the same story using the toy ducks After awhile, Jonathan moved in and started to pick up his set ofducks and copied some of his mum’s actions For the firstfew times they played, Jonathan had the picture story board

in front of him After a while this was no longer necessary.Between them they had found a way to play with somethingJonathan previously ignored

Moving on

After a few sessions where Jonathan copied his mum’s actions, hismum tried introducing some variation from the script, or ifJonathan did an action spontaneously she would copy him andgive the action words – for example, (when Jonathan knocks theducks flat) ‘Help, we’ve fallen over!’ Jonathan would find thisamusing and repeat the action over and over When he was relaxedand laughing like this his mum felt they were really connectingand sharing space – they were truly playing! If you use a particularcharacter in a variety of scripts (such as a toy figure or small bear),keep him available through the day – pop him in your shirt pocketand spontaneously include him in interactions with your child.For example, if you find yourself playing a ‘pointing at faces’

game, bring out the toy and point to his eyes, nose, mouth etc.

Make the character tickle your child or jump into his lap A goodway to introduce a new character such as a stuffed toy is to pophim in your pocket (as if it were your own) When your childnotices and perhaps pulls it out, say, ‘You’ve found spotty dog!’,then return the dog to your pocket Limit your child to a fewminutes with it – this will increase his interest in the toy and hismotivation to ‘want’ it

In summary

decide on a shared experience (either a regular activity

or something that happened and caught your child’sattention)

and write a simple story (script) underneath

or prompts to indicate the activity and a

reward/reinforcer that will follow

• Recreate the story board script If your child playsrandomly, copy him at first until he begins to takenotice and then you can start going back to the script.Aim to get him copying you

the same time copy any variations he makes and give the

actions words Create a sense of shared play by letting

him see that how he plays has a direct effect on how you

play

some away if necessary)

your child

(teddy at the seaside), at the sink, in the bath etc

However, the controlled atmosphere of indoor table-topplay is best to start off with until your child gets thehang of it

• Try to use your child’s special interests, if he has any –but be wary of them becoming too distracting.

enough The quality of your child’s interaction with you

is far more important than how long you can hold hisattention Be patient – judge how ready your child is totackle this type of activity If you feel it is beyond himnow, concentrate on the simpler interactive play

activities detailed in other chapters such as Chapter 6(‘Music’) and Chapter 8 (‘Physical Games and

Activities’) Come back to imaginative play sequenceswhen you feel you might elicit a response

spontaneous and responsive to your child’s interactionswith you Be aware that limiting his access to a toy

which appears to be interesting and important to you

will build on and increase his motivation to play with it

More suggestions

J Teddies’ tea party/picnic

J Car stopping at a zebra crossing for people to cross theroad (use white paper with black stripes drawn on for thecrossing)

J Doll putting rubbish in bin (use plastic cups for bins)

J Doll getting ready for bed (brush hair/teeth, wash)

J Dolls’ house figure washes toy car

J Elephants/rhinos/penguins washing at the zoo (use asmall dish of water each and plastic zoo models)

I can’t draw!

The prospect of drawing ‘story boards’ and picture prompts mightseem a little daunting if you don’t consider yourself to be artistic.However, you really only need to do very simple ‘stick people’drawings in different poses Then add line drawings for tables,chairs etc For example:

If you can take the time to master a few rudimentary line drawings

it will be very useful for all manner of ways of communicatingwith your child – from picture diaries to help with speech andlanguage

If you are really struggling, then fall back on the camera – set

up the toys in the sequence of the script and take a series of three

or four photos A basic instant camera is a good investment Thefilm is relatively expensive, but it will probably take you a month

to use up a normal film and develop it If you have a PC, perhapsconsider a digital camera or try clip art packages for a variety ofimages