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Description of the video:

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hi I'm Amy Gaffney I'm an educational
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consultant and a speech language
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pathologist with the Indiana Resource
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Center for Autism today I want to talk
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with you about playing with your child
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children with autism want to play but
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they don't always know how they need to
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be taught some of the play skills and
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remember play needs to be fun
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so how do we start
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well we can show our child how to play
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with certain toys and have them imitate
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us if we're going to drive the car
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around the cone
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go around and see if they will imitate
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us and they can take the car and go
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around the cone
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sometimes our children are already
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playing with some of their favorite toys
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maybe they like to play with cars and
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they like to roll them and drive them
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back and forth so we could put some
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cones for start and stop
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and Steve actually we can give them a
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Target to hit maybe we're going to push
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it and hit the cone and take turns back
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and forth and while we're driving our
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cars around we're gonna make some noises
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and say Zoom
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go car
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and if we have two of them we can say
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and both go at the same time
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green wins
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if you have if your child has certain
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toys that they like to play with but
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they find that they're playing with them
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the same way over and over again
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sometimes you can add something extra so
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that you can join in with them so maybe
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you want to introduce the car to the car
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wash that's something new so while
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they're pushing their car around you can
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take your car and say oh he's dirty I'm
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gonna go to the car wash and he goes in
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the car wash while the other car is
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driving
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and then all done nice and clean look at
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the clean car now he can drive around
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the cones so we're just adding some
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extra things to start to expand our
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child's play
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whenever your child is playing and you
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want to join in with them make sure
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you're using simple words and phrases or
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sounds to help them engage more in the
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activities that you're doing
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we can also use repetitive phrases and
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actions so maybe if we're playing catch
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we can say Ready set go and then we
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throw our ball Ready set go and then
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we'll start to say Ready Set
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and we wait to hear our child say go and
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then we throw back and forth another way
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to do it
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is to make these play activities into
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some silly simple tasks
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so here's my instead of Potato Head I
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have a pineapple head
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and on the back here we have some we can
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do two faces so we have one silly face
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on this side as the example and then I'm
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going to show my child over here where
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we can put more
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parts of our face so I just am going to
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say put in
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and put the eyeball in
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put in
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and then I'll put another one in
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put in
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here goes the eyebrow
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and then I will give my child the mouth
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and give them the cue to put in
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and then give them one more and give
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them a second to see if they will then
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follow that routine of just putting the
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pieces in to make the face on the Potato
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Head
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you can do this with a lot of different
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toys to get a child to learn a routine
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and to practice over and over again
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playing with something until they can
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become more creative on their own
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another idea is to take a special toy
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maybe like a Yoshi and Yoshi can take a
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bath
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in the bathtub from the dollar store
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and we can give Yoshi a shower
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or a bath and he has his rubber ducky
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and we say quack quack quack quack oh
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Yoshi's dirty and so we're gonna rub rub
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rub the soap rub rub rub rub rub rub the
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soap on his nose and then we wash them
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off like that
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all the soap comes off and then Yoshi's
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all clean
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and then maybe we're gonna come up with
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another toy here's our penguin
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so once our child knows to give Yoshi a
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bath we can start expanding that and
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adding some other things in so here
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comes Mr Penguin he's gonna Splash in
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the tub and here comes the owl he's
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gonna Splash in the tub
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one of the other things that children
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with autism sometimes have a lot of
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difficulty with is that imaginative play
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so we have Yoshi
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and here's Yoshi and he can if he's
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hungry and wants a snack he could have a
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role
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that's yummy yum yum yum yum yum we feed
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him to roll but now he's thirsty so
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we'll give him a drink
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so I have a cup that looks pretty real
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and I have a little croissant that looks
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pretty real for play food
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but we want to get a little more
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creative and a little more imaginative
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so now I'm going to say when I'm playing
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and with my turn
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Yoshi would you like a carrot this is
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just an orange block but I'm gonna call
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it a carrot now Yoshi eat the carrot
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oh Yoshi do you want another carrot yum
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yum yum yum yum yum yum
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what
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you want some celery and then I'll ask
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my child with the green block would you
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like to give Yoshi some celery oh he
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likes celery give him some celery Yum
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Yum Yum so now we can use some real
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things we could use a real spoon to feed
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Yoshi or we can also just use our blocks
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to start pretending that those are
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different kinds of food so there's lots
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of ways to expand and get your child
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um to learn about new ways to play with
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their toys and new ways to use things
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the dollar store is a great place to go
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to get some kid-friendly Furniture
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that's it's plastic it's really durable
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and kids can start to do routines that
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they're very familiar with like Yoshi's
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gotta go night night before they begin
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to play with even more abstract play
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such as
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driving cars around and going through
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the city and maybe using just little
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boxes to make little buildings with it
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the cars can go into you can start to do
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all kinds of fun stuff with their play
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and use all their special interest to
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get them involved we can also use visual
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supports when we're playing so we can
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have little cards that might say eat if
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we're talking about Yoshi eat drink
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sleep and you can show that card and
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then you can do the action that's
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another way to help children increase
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their play skills so I hope some of
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these ideas are helpful for you and your
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family as you guys have a good time
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sitting down on the floor and playing

Tips For Helping Your Child Play: Video Summary

Children with autism want to play, but they do not always know how. They need to be taught play skills. Remember, play needs to be fun!

  • Show your child how to play. Take your child’s toys and start to play with them. Encourage your child to join in.
  • When your child is playing, join in. Do what your child does. Use words and sounds when playing.
  • Try to expand the play. For example, if your child is lining up cars, take a car and “drive” it with sound. Zoom, zoom!
  • Show your child a video of a child playing with the same toy. There are many videos on YouTube.
  • Use visuals to help your child understand play. Show step-by-step instructions of how to play.

 

Structured Play Visual Supports

Picture routines can be made using Google images, photographs, or drawings.

View Short Video Clips for Play

 

Article To Learn More About Structured Play

If you would like to read more about structuring play, click on the link below:
https://hes-extraordinary.com/independent-play-autism

 

Examples of Structured Play

These are examples of different structured play activities.

Toy Slide and Action Figures
Cut a hole in a box. Have the child help his favorite characters climb the ladder and go down the slide. They will fall into the box. When all the characters are in the box, it’s time to do something different.


Toy Kitchen Set
Use pictures on the top of the kitchen to show the order of activities to do…1st cook the food, then eat the food, then wash the food, finally put away the toys.

Duplo Blocks
Teach beginning to play with Duplos by cutting out a jig using a piece of syrophome. Your child can begin putting the Duplo blocks in the correct spaces to make a picture. Then, give the child another set of the same blocks and have him stack the blocks on top of the first set of blocks.

DIY Bowling Set-Up
Use visual supports, such as tape for the lane and footprints on the floor to show your child where to stand to begin to learn about bowling. Say the phrase, “Ready, Set, Roll” each time he take a turn to bowl.