Do you have a child who doesn’t play with toys in the ‘correct’ way? If you do, is this actually such a problem, and if it is what should you do about it? The steps to teach autistic kids to play follows a progression, and we want to help you to engage in it.
So at The Autism Junction we have put together 5 classroom strategies for you to use that will help engage your autistic kids in play. Firstly we will look at what the actual play is, and then also look at how this play can broaden their experiences.
The cover of Dr Stuart Brown’s “Play, How it Shapes the Brain, Opens the Imagination and Invigorates the Soul” provides a great starting point for us. He challenges us all to participate in regular play activities and find our moments of “flow” at a time when greater awareness is being given to mental health and wellbeing.
If I had a pound for every time someone has said to me, “You’re a primary teacher, so you must just play all day?” I would be spending my days living by a beach in warmer climates by now. However, as I am still in the classroom, I now have wonderful responses thanks to this book for those who perceive play as a just pointless pastime for children. I do highly recommend that all teachers read this book. What you will actually find is that many students with autism are already experts at finding their “flow”, and that by engaging these autistic students in play can have incredible long term benefits.
Repetitive behaviours and playA key part of the diagnosis criteria for autism is that the individual will display repetitive behaviours. Repetition brings with it familiarity and with familiarity comes calmness. Autism can easily create high anxiety in many individuals, and they may find the world a very confusing place to be. In school for example the complexity of language, social skills and unwritten rules of engagement can leave your autistic students feeling that they are constantly trying to figure out a world that is completely alien to their own.
If you just think of the comfort we feel when we arrive home after a trip, where we know our own kitchen, the sofa feels just right, and we can find anything we need without looking. We are totally relaxed and in control, and actually often comment on how good it is to be home even if we have just been on a fantastic holiday.
To properly understand autistic students and play, we have to look beyond what we initially see. It is probably not for the love of tidying that he lines up his toy cars for example. Similarly someone playing in the small world classroom area is not necessarily a child who is engaging in imaginative play. If we look more closely, we may well observe that the same small figures being played with are all performing similar movements, and that this system of play is being repeated day in and day out.
I once taught an autistic student who suddenly took an interest in the board game snakes and ladders. He would set up all of the pieces, roll the dice and move the counters around. All of the teaching staff and I thought brilliant! We all know this game and we can therefore engage with him at last. So we then tried to play snakes and ladders with him as we knew it, and he went into complete meltdown. On closer observation, what we should have realised was that he had been rolling the dice to land on the exactly the same numbers, and in exactly in the same sequence. This therefore meant that the counters all moved into exactly the same places on the board. Truth turns out that he had watched the board game being played on TV, memorised it in full and was simply re-enacting entire the scenario.
Since that moment I have always paused, observed and then tried to understand more before attempting to explain any of my students behaviour. I find that often my brain wants me to believe something completely different to what is actually happening, and I have to guard against reacting to the apparent. Perhaps you can relate to this too?
Play provides endless opportunities to explore, engage, discover and become curious. It can provide safe access to develop relationships with others, and above all else it is fun! We need to make sure our autistic students are not missing out on this vital part of their development, especially from a young age. So with that in mind, here are The Autism Junction’s 5 strategies to consider when developing play skills in autistic students:-
1. Join your autistic students in play
Instead of using an endless bombardment of encouraging language such as “Come on Harry, come and play outside…….Harry, leave that, it’ll really be fun outside…….come on Harry, come & see this”, we have to develop a trusting relationship with our students. They need to understand a good reason to go with you as they may well be having a great time playing indoors with their cars already. So the first step to take is for us to play alongside them with similar toys. You could even create a game where you copy the child’s play and let them actually lead the fun.
A key point to mention is to be aware of how your student will communicate with you that they have had enough. What signals will they show? Don’t be surprised if a toy is thrown when they are non-verbal and in the early stages of communication development. How would you clearly communicate to someone to get out of your space if you didn’t have the words?
So try not to force the play on them. Don’t forget, five minutes play in your company could feel really intense to an autistic pupil. Try a little and often approach and remember to show that you are having fun with your body language and expression!
2. Create fun engaging moments
So why should your student participate in your activity at all? They may be perfectly happy entertaining themselves with their chosen item in the classroom.
Objects can be very stimulating for autistic students. We need to consider how to transfer these moments of high focus to include adults. This is because in the long term, you need adults to lead a certain amount of the learning and also later lead to include social interactions with others. We want the student to make a conscience decision to join and it is therefore not forced upon them. Teachers, now is the time to set your inhibitions free as you have to be just as, if not more engaging and worthwhile to be around than the iPad – now that’s a challenge.
The starting point for engaging your autistic students in play is FUN…..Moments of surprise, expression and laughter together with total involvement from the leading adult are required. You may have seen this in activities provided by speech and language therapists called What’s in the Box? Gina Davis has modelled her highly successful approach, Attention Autism on this theory. You might want to follow Attention Autism on Facebook for endless ways to present these engaging moments.
3. Model play and copying skills
How do children actually know how to play with a toy train set or a doll? At some point during their early years, someone has either demonstrated how to do it to them or they have simply copied someone’s actions. Autistic students need us to show them and therefore model what can and should be done.
A great activity is to have 2 sets of exactly the same equipment or toys. One is for you and one is for the student. Then share the same space on a table or carpet together. Now, using minimal language demonstrate how to play with your toy in front of them. Over time your student may start to copy, and you could leave your toy available for them to pick up throughout the day.
In your class team, create a script to use alongside the play activity. First select words, signs or visual cards appropriate to the level of the student. Then ensure your whole team is using the same language each time so as not to confuse the student. For example does your train go “Choo! Choo!” or “Whoo-whoo!” or “ch, ch, ch, ch, ch…” These may seem like small things, but try to see this for a student who has difficulty with language. Being told that something makes a different sound from day to day can be enough to make them disengage. And that just at a time when they were feeling confident at being at the joint play table.
4. Generalise the play
For some students it can be really uncomfortable moving away from their particular play activity of choice. They may have found security and enjoyment in one certain toy, let’s say a bear. This is time for you and your staff to be creative, with a little bit of help from Pinterest. Try to brainstorm as many activities as you can that could involve the bear.
Puppets, drawings, photo adventures, and hide and seek are a few good starting points. However you could extend this even further by creating items for the bear such a cave, or a car. The children’s book “We’re Going on a Bear Hunt” would be a perfect to help extend and generalise the play.
We once taught a student who was focused on the Mister Maker Shape song, a UK childrens TV show. If left to his own devices he would have watched the song on YouTube over and over again, all day. The student was new to school and so within our class we came up with ideas to support him. These helped in exploring the classroom and then school environment, and therefore away from the screen. We made characters, played hide and seek with them as well as dressed up as them. We then put the cut outs on the swing and slide, and took them on countless adventures in the classroom.
You can see the opportunities are endless, and guess what? As he developed an understanding of his environment through the security of the shapes, his confidence grew. Over a period of time he became less reliant and fixated on Mister Maker Shapes. We could then start to look at other learning opportunities.
5. Autistic students in social play
At a later stage play can be a strong catalyst to develop the skills needed to work alongside others. Playing with others can open us up to moments of turn taking which benefit social language skills. You might hear your speech therapist using phrases such as “spontaneous, functional communication”. This basically means can the student express what they need or want in the context of what they are doing? Social play creates natural opportunities to make requests and to learn and copy others.
When adults & their peers give time to social interactions, this helps them build trusting relationships. When younger students experience positive social interactions they learn that others can be a useful source of learning, fun, excitement and calmness. They also begin to understand what they don’t like. These core skills can only benefit the student as they grow older.
As you may be aware, students with autism experience moments of high anxiety. By letting them have a certain amount of control over their situation, you can immediately reduce many of these anxieties. You could create 2 visual choice boards:-
- Activities available for the session
- Who you can play with (children and staff)?
Your student then has an element of control over their situation and is more likely to engage in the social play activity. This works much better than “Vinnie, you are going to play in the sand tray next with Holly.” Little did you know that Vinnie really wanted to play with the water tray with Tia and that Vinnie has been avoiding Holly all week since she has had a haircut and looks very different.
So here it is, PLAY CAN BE TAUGHT. We can all lose ourselves in the flow of the activity and the experience. Autistic students may appear to be happy by repeating the same play behaviours over and over again. However we have to look and see how we can provide opportunities to ensure that all of our students experience curiosity, discovery, engagement, awe and wonder. Whatever your age, play will increase your confidence, and it is associated with positive mental wellbeing later in life.
thinking differently
The Autism Junction