Top Five Necessities for Your New School Year
Our young clients with ASD aren't really so difficult when
it comes to lesson plans for therapy and fulfilling benchmarks and outcomes. In
fact, they're very easy. Look at my list of Top Five Necessities and you'll see
that the first four are "get it and you'll have it" kind of things.
1. Bubbles
2. Mirror
3. Cushy dot
4. Pacing boards
5. Motivators for turn taking
Here
is a picture of a Cushy Dot 
Find it in the sports
section of a discount store. Officially called the Bell Inflatable Balance
Board. It has little nubbies on
either side and it helps our ASD kiddos sit in a chair. I just say, "Dot to
dot," meaning, sit your tushy on the cushy. IT WORKS. Not all children like to
use it and they don't always use it for the entire session.
Here
are varieties of Pacing Boards
- Find
these in a package of 10 as bulletin board boarders at a dollar store
- Cut
them in half
- Get
varieties of designs, colors, and learning concepts
- They
can be used for many therapeutic strategies as well as pacing
- Use
them on your bulletin board as well
Motivators
for turn taking
These vary depending on
what is motivating to a particular child. Never have fewer than 20 in a like
set of motivators.
I have collections of
motivators for turn taking activities in about everything imaginable. I store
each collection in small, mesh, zippered laundry bags from the Dollar Tree (that
way I can see what they are and the children help unzip/zip them).
Here is a "laundry
list" of some of my most popular groups of motivators:
- Bugs
- Spiders
- Frogs
- Smurfs
- Dora
- Toy
shoes
- Disney
characters
- Dinosaurs
- Farm
animals
- Zoo
animals
- Fish
- Birds
- Looney
Toons
- Letters
- Numbers
- Blues
Clues
- Magnets
- Cookie
cutters
- Holiday
- Dalmatians
- Fuzzy
balls
- M
& M's (little people)
- Dogs
- Cats
- Lizards
- Pooh
Bear
- Toy
Story
- Pop
beads
- Garanimals
- Colored
disks
- Unsharpened
pencils
- Cars
- Princesses
- Thomas
the Train
- Humpty
Dumpty's
Then,
of course, I have containers or matching containers for each group.
Where did I get all of the
groups that I have collected over time?
- From
friends and my mother
- Asked
for them as Christmas/birthday gifts
- From
dollar stores
- From
yard sales
What do you
use and what are favorites among your little kiddos for motivating turn takers?
Open your year with these five necessities and you'll be "In the PINK."
"Speech pathologists make good things
happen."