This article is about Autism and the 15 Most Popular Activities For Autism Spectrum Disorder. I hope you Enjoy!
ASD is a complex developmental disorder, which lets the autistic face severe speech difficulties and communication. A person with autism fails to focus on things happening in their surroundings and shows repetitive behavior. In addition, people with Autism Spectrum Disorder can learn everything but in a different way which is different for most other people.
Though these people face challenges in thinking, learning and lack problem-solving abilities, they require immense care and help in their daily activities.
There is no treatment for ASD, but studies have proved that a few activities or therapies can improve the abilities of autistic and help them learn essential skills.
There are many exciting games and practical play activities which have explicit goals. All of these strategies can let autistic kids focus on their environment and help them communicate with others. Through such activities, kids can analyze the information, put it together, and respond accordingly.
Multiple ASD (Autism Spectrum Disorder) activities are available; therefore, it becomes difficult for parents to pick the one or from where they should start. Here, the most adopted and popular activities which can support children with autism in learning all the essential life skills have been described.
Hopefully, all of these activities would be meaningful for all the autistic children out there. You can stay for a while and adopt any one of them according to your kid’s abilities, behavior, and needs.
Activities For Autism Spectrum Disorder
One of the most typical troubles which all the kids were suffering from autism face is communication. The kids face many difficulties while connecting or talking with other kids, like their classmates or friends. In addition, the kids also face difficulty focusing on things happening in their surroundings.
ASD (Autism Spectrum Disorder) activities are mainly designed for autistic children who face difficulties learning basic life skills. All of these activities help your kids in learning what they should and when they should do.
These activities for special needs children and ABA activities for kids help understand the steps of different procedures, learn different activities, and provide them an idea to react to their goal.
The following are the best activities for all autistic children. Always create a stress-free environment for the kids while they are learning all of these skills. It would help you in getting better results.
Involve Your Child In Daily Decisions
It is very compulsory and necessary to involve the kids in daily tasks. Kids love to participate in daily activities, so you can decide the weekly menu with them, go shopping, choose the books to read, and much more. You can also ask the help from kids in money management or many other activities.
Keep It Simple
Try to keep all the things simple. For instance, it is always recommended to keep all of your instructions short, simple, and to the point.
In addition, never give more than two to three instructions at the same time. As these kids are struggling with oral language processing, it would be better to keep things easy.
Name Game
It is an enjoyable activity, which is performed in the group. The primary purpose of this strategy is to teach the kid how he or she can introduce him or herself. Moreover, through this activity, they also learn how they can learn someone else’s name.
It is a social activity that is usually performed during the early years of school. The teacher can gather all the students in a circle by pointing out to herself to tell her name just as she introduces herself. As everyone sitting in the circle introduces him or herself, the autistic kid learns how to introduce himself.
Paint With Ice
Kids love to create beautiful designs and always want to swirl the melting paint over the paper. It is a great idea to let the kids learn the names of different colors.
Undoubtedly, it is an excellent practice for color recognition and helps the kids learn how the paint changes from one state to another.
Basketball
Like all other activities, physical activities can also be an excellent option to train autistic kids. These kids are sensitive to sound, and basketball is always played in the gymnasium with loud sounds.
So, as the ball bounces with the ground, it produces excellent sound. In the same way, players yelling at each other make significant noise. In this environment, the child will feel stress or anxiety at first. Still, he would feel comfortable and adjust himself to the environment with time.
Tell A Social Story
Children with autism face difficulties in understanding and social learning; therefore, storytelling could be a fantastic way to interact with them. It is an excellent way to engage the students, but you can also teach the kids how to peer with others.
You can create the students so that kids try to answer the questions or interact with you.
Yoga And Movement Activities
It is compulsory to make sure that your child is getting enough time to take a break while preparing for school tests or other academic activities.
Always remember that taking breaths can keep your child calm and relaxed and help him perform well at school. In addition, it would also help the child to free from the stressful daily routine. You can check multiple types of breathing exercises are available out there, and you can choose any one of them.
Emotion Cards As ASD (Autism Spectrum Disorder) Activities
These are printable cards, which are specifically designed for autistic kids. Through these emotion cards, the children learn the skills to recognize different emotions in others and themselves.
To perform this activity, you can cut the cards, put them in different sequences. After that, you can pick a card and can ask the kid about the emotion. While performing this activity, you can also give a hint.
Integrate Sensory Activities
Autistic children can be over or under-reactive towards sensory stimuli, so you need to be a little bit more careful. For instance, an echo in the surroundings or even light can trigger the child.
So, you can arrange some sensory activities for your children accordingly. For instance, you can turn or off the light and then check the kid’s response.
Visual Schedules
Visual play a very critical role and can be a great help for you to train your child. Like you, the daily schedule is essential for a child, and to make it more interesting for a child with ASD, and you can add the visual to it.
For example, the shower is a compulsory part of a daily routine. You can take different blocks, paste pictures over them, and ask the kid to arrange them in step by step order.
Similarly, you can also take pictures of different activities, print and paste them over the blocks, and let the child arrange all of them according to their daily routine.
Play The Matching Halves Game
Matching half activity is considered a great activity and therapy for kids with different mental disabilities. It is the best way to introduce the kids to different types of puzzles.
Through this activity, the kids will try to match different colors and shapes, so you would find it an excellent option to keep them engaged in mental activity.
Sorting With Snacks As ASD(Autism Spectrum Disorder) Activities
It is the best fun activity for the kids, specifically during their math time. To perform this activity, you can use different types of foods, including crackers or snacks. Make sure that the food is always easy to sort. Multi-colored snacks are considered to be ideal for this activity.
You can ask the kids to arrange the snacks according to their color, shape, or size. And at the very next step, teach them different mathematical operations, including addition, subtraction, and much more.
Science Experiments As ASD (Autism Spectrum Disorder) Activities
Science experiments are great fun for all elementary students. All of these activities give you a chance to grab the kids’ attention, let you engage them in academic activities, and teach them whatever you want while they are having great fun.
For instance, you can teach the students about different states of matter through experiments. Kids love and enjoy the fantastic results that come as a result of all of these science activities.
Fidget Toys
Fidget toys are well known for being the best sensory toys that help kids suffering from different sensory disorders, including autism. The toys help the kids to stay calm and focused.
You can put these toys around the kid. Well, as multiple options are available there, you can choose anyone like a fidget spinner, popsicle sticks, or anything according to the requirements of kids.
Coloring
It is an excellent activity for kids with autism and the best way to keep the kids calm. Indeed it is a tremendous mind0-body exercise that keeps the kids calm, busy, and relaxed. So, you can let the kids color if they are ignited by any stimuli and make them within no time.
Ending Note
People who have autism fail challenges in all of their daily life activities. Above all, they fail to communicate effectively with others. Thus require help from others to accomplish all of their tasks.
The diagnosis for this condition is challenging as there is no specific test for this disorder. The physician gets to know about the condition from the behavior of the child.
There is no specific treatment for this disorder, but through exciting and practical strategies, one can improve kids’ behavior. Though these therapies are a little bit difficult to implement, you can get some fruitful results through proper care, love, and affection.
References
- https://www.waterford.org/education/15-activities-teaching-strategies-and-resources-for-teaching-children-with-autism/
- https://blog.stageslearning.com/blog/12-popular-games-adapted-for-children-with-autism
- https://www.scholastic.com/teachers/articles/teaching-content/teaching-students-autism-spectrum-disorder/
- https://raisingchildren.net.au/autism/school-play-work/play-learning/structured-play-asd
- https://raisingchildren.net.au/autism/communicating-relationships/communicating/paying-attention-asd
- https://www.psychiatry.org/patients-families/autism/what-is-autism-spectrum-disorder
- https://www.cdc.gov/ncbddd/autism/facts.html
- https://www.merakilane.com/aba-therapy-activities-autism/
- https://harkla.co/blogs/special-needs/therapeutic-activities-autism
- https://www.education.com/magazine/article/10-activities-children-autism/