Route Games 2

Walking Skipping Dancing Running Jumping Hopping Scooting Sliding Marching Twirling Swaying Crawling

For many children with autism, simply shifting attention back and forth between where one is going and the task of staying beside a moving partner is challenging. In these games, moving together toward a destination is complicated by a variety of challenges. It might be enough of a challenge for your child to simply stay beside you but once your child can do this, there are endless delightful ways to move and things to do along the way. If your child can't stay beside you yet, hold hands or put him or her on your shoulders and try some of these Route Games. Like so many basic game structures, Route Games are limited only by your imagination.

Walk with Me

Many children with autism are not so good at staying next to a parent when they are out and about. Moving Together games are fun but they are also intended to help children learn this very important skill. Here is a game that works on walking together: Lay blue painters tape in a route along the floor in two side-by-side rows. Start at one end with your son or daughter and hold hands, saying Walk with me. Using a playful tone of voice, move together all the way along the route at a normal clip and when you get to the end, celebrate this in some way--with a tickle or a treat, a kiss or a twirl. Turn around and do the route again, hand-in-hand. This time, stop at times. Walk fast and then slow and then fast again. Make sure your child stays beside you and reward success at the end of the route. You stayed right beside Mommy! Gradually (over the course of the day or the over a month, depending on your child) let go of your child's hand and expect him or her to stay beside you as you stop and start, go faster or slower, turn this way or that. Reward success. Start over when your child does not stay with you. Go back to holding hands if you need to. Eventually take this game on the road. Walk together, side-by-side, faster and slower, stopping and going on sidewalks and in parks, in shopping malls and in parking lots.

Note: Although I remember teaching children to walk beside me twenty years ago in an early childhood setting, the added elements of intentionally walking faster and slower, stopping and starting--this I learned in an RDI workshop. Making a game of it has become a standard activity in our clinic ever since.

It is Easier to Learn While Moving

It is a grown-up perspective to think that learning is easier while sitting at a table. Kids believe, correctly, that learning is better while moving. Learning really does occur much quicker and new information is retained better while moving. Besides, kids are more willing learners while moving.

Moving Together is Challenging but Fun!

The Step On Letters Game is a way to learn the names of letters but the structure of this game can be used to teach the name of anything that you can step on. Pull photos off the Internet and make a game of stepping on zoo animals or vehicle. Put the photos in a plastic sleeve to make them last for more than one game. For that matter, you don't have to step, you can dance on, hop on, twirl on.... For example, if your child knows the letters, teach action words by playing the game. You can say sit on A and then demonstrate by sitting on a different A on the floor. You can cover up letters, jump on letters, go to sleep on letters and so on. If you want to teach numbers, then put numbers on the floor. If you take this game onto the Advanced Level, you can tell your child to step on the picture of a girl who looks sad or sit on the picture of the boy with a red hat on his head.

Step On Letters teaches children about taking turns, giving verbal directions, and taking verbal directions. In other words, Step On Letters is a prototype for a thousand Moving Together Games that you can play to teach anything you want to teach.

Inspiration for Moving Together Games

Some of the best moving together games that I know are from the RDI literature and workshops. These games are described very well in the RDI Intervention Books.

I am gradually posting video clips of these games as they are played by kids at my clinic but I still refer you to the RDI Activity Book because it is useful to read all the ways to play the same games and all the reasons to play to play these games.

Row, Row, Row Your Boat

This is a Moving Together Game I found on You Tube. In the clip here, you can see how the mother has used the moving routine to keep her son engaged for a long period of time.

Notice the use of music, the way they are sharing emotions, and the way that novel language is embedded in the framework of the repeated phrases. All of these things are helping this little boy attend to the language and participate.

Hot!

A favorite RDI game in our clinic is Hot. I never know how many family members will show up for a session with some of my Kiddos. When I have a large group, I almost always try to get the group to play this game. I sit Grandma, Mom, Dad, and older brother all down on different bean bag chairs with the child on his own or on a bean bag chair with a parent. The bean bag chairs are in a circle. When anyone yells Hot! everyone moves to a new bean bag chair.

Most children love this game. Occasionally, the rapid, chaotic movement where everyone is looking for a new bean bag chair is upsetting to a child. If this is true for your child, move slowly. Move one chair over. Add a song as you move.

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