DIY Classroom Projects

1. DIY Concentration-Focus Station for Independent Work:


I was googling different items that I wanted to purchase for my classrooms, when I came across something called a concentration station. Such a brilliant idea; I remember using something similar in school, but it was as a punishment not an antecedent intervention. It got the ball rolling on this...

View of the inside; not painted yet. I think I will paint it one solid colour for minimal distractions.

Side view

View from the back

We got a new computer for Christmas, and it came in a neat little box. It is narrow, but high, and opens like a drawer to reveal a little shelf inside. When I saw how conveniently it folds up, I knew it was perfect for my DIY craft.

2. DIY Crash Mat for in-Class Relaxation, Quiet Reading:
At school we made a huge crash mat, under a lovely OTs recommendation. We took an old duvet cover, and filled it with pieces of square foam which we bought (and cut up) from Walmart. Though it was DIY it was still a bit expensive, but nothing compared to what it would have retailed for at a therapy store :)

In this photo you can see that the crash pad is a bit wet in some spots; because it is a duvet it so super easy to spot-clean. When you need to give the whole thing a solid wash, throw the duvet cover into the washing machine. Please remember to take out to foam!




3. DIY Sensory Cool Down: it is Mobile too!

I have talked about my bean buckets before, but in case this is the first you are hearing of it...here is some more information! After sesnory overload, or sensory meltdowns, some of our kids needs help learning to self regulate. By offering tactile opportunities, without demands, we provide a wonderful way for that child to regroup (which is something many of our kidlets struggles with). Kids plunge hands into bean bucket (usually initiated by he instructor at first, then the child once he or she begins to receive feedback from the tactile opportunities. See image below for example; here is what can go into a bean bucket!

-Dry beans
-Dry lentils of various colours
-Textured beads, multicoloured
-Gluten Free Pasta shells
-A sprinkling of corn flour
HAPPY DIGGING!

The bin is from Wal Mart; a nice heavy duty plastic that can withstand lots of use and transportation...do not forget that this is very mobile! When you are in a shared space like us, mobility becomes top priority for clean-up days!

4. Re-purposed Book Rack

I really love book racks; I think they are a fantastic way to present themed literature to my little ones. I scoped it out online, and the best I could find was somewhere between 45-75$ for what I considered a decent purchase. I knew I could do better than that, so I headed to IKEA. I found a dish rack, the perfect size for paper back children's books; for about 10$ I had my new book rack and boy was it a steal! I still had overflow, so I purchased a few square tuperwares from the dollar store...and my book area was complete. I also found an increadible crash-mat-like item at a discount store, which I picked up for 27$ and VOILA! A DIY book area....for less than the cost of a book rack. I will post pictures as soon as it's set up at school.

Baking Baking!

Icing, Filling: GFCF Fluff and Jam

The batter is Betty Crocker White Cake; I made 2 batches, 1 with dairy-free chocolate chips, and 1 without. I did not put icing in the chocolate chip ones...overkill I thought :)

Love the baking tray; it was a Christmas gift I was itching to use!

I stuck the icing right into the cupcake; it was an airy batter so I did not need to scoop anything out.

The glossy look is from the fluff; not my cleanest work but GFCF and YUMMY!

Tis the Season Around MM

Kids Craft!

Getting into the Holiday spirit is inevitable with an impending Winter Holiday Concert; on top of rehearsals and learning new holiday songs, here are some ways we set the mood in the class and around school in a way that is sensory friendly!

-(Activity)Gluten Free Ornament Making; a sensory activity that requires kiddos to press down salt-dough, make an imprint with a cookie cutter, and peel away the excess; we added glitter to make our batter extra sensory! Next, you bake the ornaments--don't forget to poke a hole for the string! Microwave the dough on high for 2 minutes, flip it over half way through and be careful, it gets super hot! Kids practice waiting, and maybe eat a holiday treat or two. Equal parts salt and gf flour, add water gradually until you get the right consistency.

-(Theme)Candles: Candles are a universal sign for the holidays, and happen to be an important component of Kwanza, Channukah and Christmas; similarly for Diwali, it is customary to light lamps (just ask Miss Stephanies class, they have learned ALL about it). For our concert we will be singing several songs about Candles, and have decorated our classes with Menorahs affixed with all the necessary candles; we use these to practice counting 1-8. I cannot stress enough that candles are best not lit; they provide tons of colour without being overly stimulating and often evoke conversation and important terminology in our kids.

-(Decoration) Iridescent Winter Streamers: You know those streamers that change colour depending on the way you look at them, we found great ones at the Dollar Store and they are complete with Santa, Penguin and Snowman. We hung them from a re-purposed drying rack turned mobile (we are very thrifty) and hung the mobile from the tiles in the ceiling; the kids love to look up and watch them twirl and spin. Add a slight freeze from a fan and it is even more exciting.

-(Decorations, Activities)Dreidels:  Dreidels are a game traditionally played at Channukah; the simple fine-motor game involve turn-taking, waiting, and most importantly involves at least one period where every child gets to be either ahead or behind (both important skills to practice being gracious about). We have decorated our classrooms with multi-coloured dreidels, also purchased at the dollar store and used to increase reciprocal play (hint: provide a guide so that everyone can remember what each Hebrew letter means for the person who rolls it).

-(Decoration, Theme, Activity) Snowmen: If you walk into the office, a snowman will greet you on your way in; in our classroom, we have snowmen chair covers on select chairs, also purchased for $2 at the dollar store...such a bargain. I find myself calling upon snowmen a lot as a theme during Natural Environment Teaching (NET), I think this is because it seems to be on the minds of my kids...in everything they do. Look Miss Alley (we made a)* snowman! (Out of yoga balls in the gym!) Look Miss Alley, (I made a)** snowman (out of Glorb in the fine motor area); not to mention it also came up in Circle time (weather) and math (shapes). *was not included in original statement :P **was not included in original statement :)

-Bean Bucket On-hand: Kids sometimes feel the stress of the end of the year...can you believe it?
No matter the season, sensory meltdowns happen and when they do, you need to be ready to redirect and deescalate. One way we do this at work is by having a bean-bucket on-hand, to be introduced systematically and carefully, as not to reinforce undesired behaviours.

To be continued...pictures to come.

Zoom Zoom Zoom We're Going to the Moon

Some of you asked about more information about our brand new Drama Club!

Fridays second class was a huge success; with the class in almost-full attendance and with Going into Space as our theme, we practiced social skills in a totally hands-on way. Old friends reunited and the seeds were planted for new friendships to come.

Here are some of the skills we targeted...but shh don't tell the kids.

-Attending (Looking at at the teacher)

-Following instructions in a group

-Motor imitation 1:1, in a group

-Reciprocal Play

-Self-Regulation

-Imagination/Pretending Skill Building

-Social engagement and sustained interaction

-Responding to peers

-Imitation

-Inviting others into play

-Accepting invitations from others

-Basic drama vocab

-Voice modulation
-Interpreting Facial Expressions/Body Language

We hit these marks in ways that were fun, interactive, and child-centered (THAT'S the buzz word around MM).

We had some goals in mind, and a handful of activities in our back pocket to ensure meaningful learning, but we also really let the kids lead the way. Coached by my team, it was incredible to see how these kids came together and formed the beginning of social relationships.

It is so incredible how a piece of costuming or a prop can bring a shy child into the world around him or her; with some good quality modeling (of appropriate behaviour and expectations) I can tell that our kids are going to thrive

See you next Friday!

The Director ;) 

Eek. Stage Fright.

I started this post this weekend, and am now finishing it as I am home on a sick-day....so, if some thoughts are not fully developed I apologize.

When I first saw "Autism the Musical" I knew somehow it would impact my career; I wasn't sure at that point exactly how, or when, but I knew at some point it would become obvious to me. When I was a kid I lived for my drama programs and I have always known that I wanted to somehow recreate that for other kids. I don't think I would be where I am today if it wasn't for the confidence I developed on stage.

Recently in my career, as many of you know, I have considered the characteristics of Autism as barriers to be overcome, and have been coming up proactive and stress free ways of practicing these skills on a regular basis in my therapy-based school programs. My thoughts are...if you practice overcoming barriers, you obviously get better at it. That is always the goal.

As a centre-based practice that incorporates a lot of arts by our approach, I have seen what the arts can do to bring a child with Autism out of his or her own head and into the active world. After giving it some thought, I realized that drama is used in my programs more than I realized; rehearsal is a natural part of learning for children with Autism, we do it every day (5 to 10 times).

After a recent meeting with our clinical supervisor, and assistant, I found myself drawing ties between what was said about performance anxiety related to speech deficit and the programming I am doing for our new Drama Kids program. Essentially, the main point was that no matter how well-rehearsed a child is (or how rote for that matter), he or she may still suffer from performance anxiety when it comes to actual functional interaction. I think he meant that I should be playful in my programming and avoid rote learning, but also...I think...that I try to break down that barrier and increase the overall occurrence of comfortable language use, and make it reinforcing so its likely to occur again.

As I plan for our new drama kids program, I am struggling a bit to find ways to elicit and practice communication skills within a  group dynamic... without eliciting the dreaded performance anxiety. I know that as the kids get to know each other and us as teachers, it will become easier. Now how do I tell them that? 

One strategy I will use is breaking the group into small fragments (dyads or triads); meeting too many new friends all at once, is overwhelming even for me. Of course, we will meet to warm up and cool down as a group, but most activities will happen with just a handful of kids, so everyone is super involved.  Hopefully, this will help ease the little actors into their new friendships. With so many different learner profiles in the class, it will be interesting to see how the dynamic plays out. I have developed a whole curriculum's worth of materials and am certain that at the very least, we will produce happy and confident learners. Though I know social skills will always be the focus, and will always be incorporated to rules and expectations, there will be limited demands at first, allowing for true self-expression.

Any tips and/or advice is always appreciated.

ABA/IBI and ABLLS-R Assessments

You know it has been a busy month when you visit your own blog and realize it has been just about a month since your last post. Sigh. I am one of those people! I apologize, life got busy...really busy!
Needless to say, things have been getting hectic at MM and new staff is just the beginning.

We are excited to be taking on IBI clients funded by TPAS and are looking forward to meeting their strict requirements for delivery. Working with a registered psychologist, and under our fabulous BCBA , we are lucky to be learning, growing and programming a lot.

We have also been busy transitioning new kids into MM. With new clients comes more ABLLS assessments, which seem to be taking up a whole lot of my attention lately. ABLLS Assessments are the only part of my ABA world that makes me feel like a drill Sargent; it can be painful. You barely know the child, and you have to get through a whole kit of material.  If I were the child, I would not want to answer me either; I imagine if my kids had the ability, they would say ENOUGH ALREADY or WHY ARE YOU MAKING ME DO ALL THIS STUFF?! But, since the assessment is vital to the program I am constantly trying to find fun, hands on and almost-sneaky ways to test knowledge without putting pressure; might I add that it is so incredibly hard to stop myself from prompting some times. I am so used to most-to-least prompting, which really eliminates the whole frustrated child element; now I remember why we use that philosophy!

It seems like over the past month, I have really made a dive into the world of IBI. I love being able to create such comprehensive programs; the ABLLS-R allows me to ensure development across all domains in a really systematic way. The only time I get to target every single domain, every single day, is when the child is receiving somewhere between 20-40 hours per week (i.e. IBI). It's dreamy to create those programs.

Even though in the past, I was doing TONS of ABA Therapy (1:1, Dyads, Tryads, you name it), it has always been less than 20 hours per week per child  (way less, more in the area of 3-8 hours in general for most of my kids and with much more of a ...dare I say....almost-floor time approach (but all the while having my behavioral principles in my back pocket). Getting busy on the IBI side of things means room for more staff; we are always looking for additional professionals to join our team. There has been tons of inquiry lately, but I do stress that applicants ought to have a minimum of post-graduate training in a related field; if you know a dedicated professional that works with the exceptional population, and has formal training in ABA, Education, Psychology or Disability Studies give us a shout!

These days, I have both ABA and IBI going on in-centre daily; I get to see the results of  traditional IBI (20 or more hours), the results of ABA Therapy and Enriched Group Learning at MM, and the results of ABA Therapy and public school; it certainly is interesting to have first-hand experience analyzing the benefits and risks of each learning situation, for each child. Parents always want to know what path will produce the best outcome, of course it is always relative to the child, but that is not to say that having insight into the types of learners that thrive in various scenarios will not be valuable to us as professionals and you as parents.

On top of all of that, we are already somehow gearing into summer as we seek accreditation from various boards in Ontario and let's not forget Winter Break Camp, which is just around the corner.

ESL Learners and language delays

I LOVE working in the heart of North York;  we don't have to go too far to experience various regional cultures, it's charming and welcoming.

A social experience is always just down the hall, street, or down the block at the local grocer. Working with clients from diverse backgrounds is an obvious reality for most professionals in the Greater Toronto Area; as Torontonians we are diverse, and proud of it. In addition to being multi-cutural our city is also multi-lingual. I speak English and French, but that's it (and is barely the tip of the ice berg in terms of the languages spoken in T.O.).

When working with early learners with language delays, it is essential to examine the child's language skills relative to the primary language spoken in the family home; too often a child is scored too low because his first language is French and the assessment is conducted in English. A thorough practitioner would account for all of these details, and believe me it can be difficult. There are a tremendous number of variables which impact learning style and rate; before a meaningful program can begin an intensive assessment always occurs. The assessment results are held as the baseline upon which future progress is measure; as a result, it's important that as practitioners, we get it right (not over or under estimated any child's ability). The results of which are delivered to the parents in an individual support plan (ISP), which also must consider that English may not be the parent's first language. SO many variables, but it seems like the least we can do as practitioners.

A child with limited language requires systematic instruction tailored to the unique learner profile. Personally, when working with early learners that speak English as a second language,  I tend to focus mostly on pairing single words with gestures; I try to use the child's name a lot "Timmy come" while gesturing towards me; "Mikey play" while gesturing to the toys. Like always in my teaching, I strive for maximum spontaneous eye-contact and try to meet the child's sensory needs through various activities aimed at keeping the child calm and regulated (play dough, small patterning materials, glorb, shaving cream, corn starch, seeds and rice).

When the learner is more advanced, and assuming he or she still speaks English as a second language, I tend to  break down my sentences to short and clear phrases; I continue to pair gestures with words and use varied visuals to assist in the process of generalization. I like to focus on labeling programs to start, because it gets momentum going. I tend to stress the importance of annunciation (this often leads to phonics review) and depending on the child, may target any combination of social skills, math skills, reading skills, and conversational skills. Receptively language is another go-to goal whether or not the child has language delays. I find that a lot of the students that speak more than one language, while also possessing a language delay (however slight or severe), benefit from several components of ABA therapy including but limited to the domains listed above.