Classroom Visual Supports

Classroom Visual Supports

Autism Visual Supports are an intrinsic cornerstone of progressive learning and communication for children and adults with communication difficulties.

Guest Post – Jessie Autism Class Teacher

In this weeks post for my Autism 101 series, we speak with Jessie, Autism class teacher and we look at Autism Visual Supports in the classroom from her perspective.

 

Practical Advice on Using Classroom Visual Supports

Engagement and Attention

Autistic children if not provided with fun and engaging activities/learning opportunities may be less likely to attend and engage in tasks for a length of time, but there are numerous strategies that have been proven to support children with this.

Consistency and Autism Visual Supports

Despite having the best visual supports, you need to check for meaning and understanding. You need to make sure you have developed individualised resources to support the child and then consistently continue to individualise the resources to their needs.

Many Autistic children thrive on sameness and routine. Many Autistic children, learn best when the people around them are all working off the same script. It is important that whatever approach/system is being used in school is also adopted at home and vice/versa (if working well etc).

Your child needs to see you being consistent, so they learn that when you say “it’s work time”, “it’s table time”, etc. that they know that it is happening right now and they know what to expect. Also put a name on it whether it’s “work time”, “table time” or whatever you decide, label it and be consistent in using the label.

Anxiety in Children with Autism

There are many supports and strategies that we can use to help Autistic children who also have co-occurring anxiety. The first thing we can do is be proactive and implement strategies to prevent children from feeling anxious in the first place, but we also then need to teach children coping strategies so that when they are feeling anxious they have strategies which they can use to keep themselves calm.

Autism Visual Schedules

Visual schedules can be made up of pictures or the written word. Depending on your child’s word based understanding and symbolic understanding, you might make up the schedule for your child using pictures of places and activities, or if your child can read and write you could write the schedule together.

Depending on your child’s understanding of days of the week, you could have a full weekly timetable showing where the child will be or what he/she will be doing each day of the week. This was particularly helpful for a child I worked with who had different people picking him up from school on certain days of the week. Each morning, he was able to check his schedule, note what day it is and who would be coming to collect him from school on that day. He could also clearly see ahead how many days were left until the weekend. First-Then boards can also be used alongside visual schedules, e.g. First school, Then Nana’s house.

It is important that you break down the individual steps involved and prepare your child for potentially stressful things that may happen and remind them of coping strategies that they can use if needed.

Coping Strategies

Deep Breathing

Deep breathing is a coping tool which many adults use to alleviate anxiety and it can be very helpful to children experiencing anxiety if we teach them how to use it. Create a visual deep breathing system schedule of 5 deep breaths. It is important that you teach this skill when your child is calm and not when they are experiencing anxiety.

Have your child practice this skill on a daily basis. Model how to take a deep breath – prompting them to “Smell the flowers, Blow out the candles”. As your child takes each deep breath, they stick the visual onto each number. Once your child has mastered and understands how to use the system you can them prompt and remind your child to use it when they are stressed or experiencing anxiety.

Request a Break

It is important that your child knows how to request to leave and take a break from a stressful situation. You can find several different visuals of a break to choose from online

Again you need to teach this skill when your child is calm and not experiencing anxiety. Talk to your child about what it means to take a break and support them to take a break from different activities throughout the day.

Show them what to do whilst on a break, and make it a positive experience. Once your child understands what a break is, you can then prompt it when your child is experiencing anxiety. It is important that your child asks for a  break his/herself so rather than saying “let’s go take a break”, show them the picture of a break and ask them what they need, so that over time they learn that when I feel stressed I can ask for a  break  myself.

Activities

Find some activities that your child enjoys and that seem to have a calming effect on him/her. Create a basket of these activities and have them in the same place at home, you can also bring them with you if you go somewhere new. Items that you might include could be a mindfulness CD, sensory toys, bubbles, mindfulness colouring, a special soft toy or blanket, etc. But again, these all depend on your child and what relaxes him or her.