My son Lucas was diagnosed with autism one day before his third birthday. He had attended a typical preschool class for two and three-year-olds but instead of exploding in play and language like others his age, he was falling behind. His preschool teachers described him as being in his own world and not participating. While he wasn’t engaging in dangerous or disruptive behavior, he needed more support.
We chose to do at home ABA therapy as well as this preschool opportunity with a one on one ABA therapist to attend with him. Not every parent has a choice about sending their child to an all day care, sometimes it has to be done because of work or other situations. However, every child who is falling behind with language, play skills, and social skills really needs some type of one on one ABA and intensive intervention.
In this episode and the play and social skills book I discuss, there are a lot of play suggestions and interventions that many children will not be ready for. You really need to focus on these play skill prerequisites or baby play skills before moving onto more heavily language based play. A typically developing baby will first start engaging in play with eye contact, cooing, and smiling at a caregiver’s face. Between 12 to 18 months they will start pointing, reaching, and gesturing toward items they want to engage with.
If the child is pulling the caregiver’s hand to an item and placing it on it, this is called hand leading and is actually an early sign for autism. After 15 months, a typically developing child will bring things to a caregiver to show or get attention. Early play will look like stacking, putting items in something, attending on the floor or at a table, and being aware when someone enters the room. As a typical child develops into a toddler, advanced play will look like sharing, turn taking, greetings, understanding games, pretending, etc. All of these involve a lot of beginning language skills that are really necessary before teaching play skills.
My approach involves pairing up play while attending a table, to practice language and making it really fun. Once you’ve tackled these beginning skills in expressive and receptive language, you’ll be ready to start trying some of the situations in the play and social skills book. I’ve linked this book, Play Time/ Social Time, available digitally for free. Inside you’ll find some of the play scenarios we discuss in the episode.
For example, a bean table with toy props like cups and funnels and cars, with a script to challenge children in engaging with passing toys and sharing attention. Or props for a pretend birthday party, where children will engage in a pretend party; passing plates, “blowing out” candles, etc. Each of the activities shared in the book can be planned and prepared ahead of time and provide suggested items lists and scripts for prompting. If you use these scenarios over and over, be sure not to solely follow the script each time so that the child does not memorize the play scene and is interacting naturally.
This rebroadcast is a great refresher and resource for working on play skills and play interventions. Next week, I will be answering some commonly asked questions about play and social skills, so be sure to tune it!
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