AllPlay Learn

Ask yourself – where is the best location for my child to learn today? Not just the desk, but the whole house - what are the opportunities within the home/garden for learning and for relaxing?

Would my child benefit from one or many learning spaces? Will different spaces work best at different times of the day or different days of the week? Does my child work best in one space?

What does my child need to learn? – a cushion, or physical assistive technology such as a sensory tool or slope board?

Where will my child learn best? - You might plan to do different activities in different areas across the day. Things you could try: Use tape, furniture, mats, rugs and cushions to section off areas. Learning activities could take place in different locations: on the couch, in a bean bag, in the garden, on a trampoline, or when walking.

What makes a learning space effective for my child? What is the influence of distractions? Smells? Bright lights? Proximity to carers? Seating? Table height? Access to food or drink?

Avoid setting up activities and learning spaces under florescent lights or glare from windows, near noisy or strong-smelling areas such as bathrooms/kitchens, or doors that are opened and closed regularly. Things you could try: Use posters, curtains, sheets to reduce glare of windows.

Use tablecloths and sheets to cover items that might distract - where possible keep patterns and colours to a minimum.

Use headphones or restructure your day during times of high activity/noise.

Make sure that all the materials required for the day are organised and easy to access, to build your child’s independence. Things you could try: Plan the workspace with your child (e.g., books on a shelf, pens in a drawer).

Make your child’s daily schedule visual – put it up on the wall – a whiteboard or poster so the whole family can see and stay on track.

Break up the day – have a mix of formal and informal learning activities as well as sensory breaks, active leisure and down-time.

Invite your child to have a say – ask them what they would like to do, and in what order.

Have reasonable expectations – learning at home will be different to learning at school.

Use a timer to visually support the completion of set tasks to maintain pace during online learning activity.

Build sensory breaks into your day – be guided by your child. Could frustration, a loss of concentration, or increased fidgeting be your child communicating a need for a sensory break? Would it help to have a number of sensory break activities and ideas nearby when your child needs a brain and movement break?

Ideas for resetting in-between tasks could include – bouncing on a trampoline, jumping on a mini trampoline, swinging in a hammock, doing push ups against the wall, sharing big hugs or a deep-pressure massage, taking a break with therapy-putty or a fidget spinner.

Use simple objects like coloured play dough and bubble wrap, having a blanket or a soft toy on your lap to provide a sense of security, while writing and drawing in different way, such as making letter out of playdough or writing on a shower screen can reduce tension while boosting language development.

Noise cancelling headphones may give your child a break loud from sounds and help them to focus.

Curriculum adjustments - what curriculum adjustments are agreed on in your child's Individual Learning Plan (ILP)?

Will activating the accessibility options on your existing technology assist your child? For example, enlarging the size of screen text, changing the background colour to make text more readable or using free text to speech and speech to text (dictation technology) settings.

Specific technology adjustments - what adjustments assist your child to learn? Do they use a switch or joystick to access learning activities on a touch screen or specific IT programs such as Read&Write for Google Chrome (R&W4G) or Proloquo2Go?

Utilise NDIS or other support workers to assist your child with remote learning.

Consider demonstrations using video modelling – film yourself or another member of your family completing your child's learning task first.

Photograph the steps in a learning task or the student completing the task to make visual learning schedules.

Film or voice record instructions, and/or answers. This will allow your child to play the instructions back as many times as necessary.

If either of these tools are not appropriate for your child's learning and accessibility requirements, please contact your child’s teacher to indicate you would benefit from consulting with your child's allied health professional i.e. Speech and Language Pathologist, Occupational Therapist or Physiotherapist for recommendations for alternative tools.