When a child with autism, Asperger’s or PDD-NOS is diagnosed it is often quite obvious to families to see why Speech Therapy is an important part of intervention. However it is not often clear how Occupational Therapy can be utilised to improve their child’s “Sensory Processing” which has a huge impact on their  social and communication development.

As you may or may not know “Sensory Processing is the organisation of sensation for use” (Ayres). What this means is that our brains are constantly taking in sensory information from our surroundings and trying to make sense of it. We then process this information to be able to behave and learn in an effective manner.

Many children with autism can be challenged in this area of development which makes the world a very confusing and sometimes crazy place to exist! Much of their energy is spent trying to interpret the sensations that they are receiving and they are often not able to focus on the things that we think are important. When this flow of sensations in the brain is disorganised, life can be like a rush hour traffic jam, so no wonder it becomes hard for children with autism to concentrate!!

Poor Sensory Processing is one of the major reasons why children with autism can have so much difficulty with ‘attention’ (among other things).

If your child has problems with Sensory Processing you may notice that your child…

1. Spends too much time attending to certain parts of toys/objects

2. Is drawn to certain games/activities that have a visual, auditory, touch or other sensory focus

3. Has difficulty focussing when in noisy or busy environments

4. Doesn’t play with toys in a conventional way but chooses to find a sensory way of playing with it

5. Becomes easily overexcited in activities

6. Switches very quickly from being calm to very agitated/upset

7. Has the need to constantly move

8. Changes quickly from one activity to the next etc, etc

In order for your child to be able to socialise, communicate and learn effectively from others it is vital that they are able to attend and focus in a calm, organised and alert state. If they are having trouble with this then they are going to find it very hard to learn effectively through ‘joint attention’ with other people, which is necessary for the development of social and communication skills.

Occupational therapists, that specialise in ASD, can certainly assist you with improving your child’s attention and focus by carrying out Sensory Integration Therapy. Please never underestimate the importance of ‘sensory integration’ work because getting your child into their optimum state is the foundations of all learning.

If you do not have access to an Occupational Therapist who specialises in sensory integration and/or you would like to learn more about this necessary area of development (as many professionals do not have time for training parents during their sessions) …please take a look at my training modules ‘Sense Part 1 and 2’.

I would also love to hear your stories of how improving your child’s sensory processing skills has had a greater impact on your child’s learning as well as social and communication development.

Please click here to share your comments

Related posts:

1. Help! My child finds it hard to concentrate
2. One Habit to Avoid for Better Communication
3. Is Your Child’s Therapy Team Really Working Together?

Howdy all,

This week’s tip as the subject says is a quickie, but a goodie

Have you ever noticed that after your child has been jumping on the trampoline, swimming, swinging, playing chasings or basically just moving around that they are a lot more talkative and chatty, or if your child is not talking yet that they are playing around with their vocalisations more?

Well there is a reason for this…

Movement stimulates the language areas of the brain.

This is one of the BIG reasons why I incorporate a lot of movement activities into my therapy sessions with the kids. In fact, with one of my clients, Max, I used to carry out his entire session on a platform swing! This is simply a swing with a large flat base.

We used the swing with Max because:

1. He enjoyed it, so it was very motivating for him
2. The back and forth movement of the swing was very calming and organising for his nervous system which helped get him into a good state for learning during the session.
3. The movement stimulated the language areas of his brain.

So very quickly the swing became an important part of our sessions and a critical element for maximising the productivity of our therapy time! Consequently it also helped Max learn at a much faster pace!

BUT I’m not suggesting that you rush out and get a platform swing!

Because that is not the point of this week’s tip…

As I often say, every child with autism or aspergers is so unique and needs strategies and therapy techniques that are going to work best for them. So while the swing worked well for Max, it may not be an effective strategy for another child.

What I really want you to take away from this week’s tip is that…

Understanding your own child’s unique nervous system is so crucial for selecting and carrying out an effective treatment plan for them.

Just because something worked for another family or is very popular or has a slick marketing brochure does not mean that it will be an effective intervention for your child!

Over the years I have heard stories from many of my clients of how they spent months or in some unfortunate cases even years trying different treatments and therapies with little or no measurable progress.

But trust me, when you get it right (or even close to right) you’ll definitely know it!

Your child will absolutely love what they are doing and the leaps and bounds they make with their development will knock your socks off!

So just some more food for thought.

Please share your story
Have you had an experience with a program or intervention that for whatever reason was not as effective as you had first hoped? If so, please share your story with us below. You will really be helping other families understand the importance of knowing their child and discovering the most effective intervention for them.

Like more help?
If you would like more help learning about all of the individual characteristics of your child’s autism so you can feel empowered and confident to make the best decisions for their treatment, then please take a look at our Home Training Program.

Till next week!
Monique

Related posts:

1. Help! My child finds it hard to concentrate
2. Is there a ‘Magic Formula’ for Autism?
3. Nutty therapy idea that worked!
   Help improve the attention span of your child with autism

Since you are reading this I’m guessing that the subject line may have grabbed your attention which is great because….

What I have to tell you today is very important. In fact it may change the way you think about just about every aspect of your child’s treatment.

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I often get asked to give families strategies to help deal with specific behaviours such as ‘toilet training’ or ‘picky eating’ or ‘poor sleeping patterns’.

It would certainly make my job MUCH easier if I could tell each one of you that ONE particular strategy would be the ‘Magic Formula‘ for solving each of these issues.

But the truth is…

because every child with autism (like any child) is so incredibly different and so unique, there simply isn’t a ‘magic formula’ or one strategy in particular to remedy these individual behaviours.

But there is a solution… so please read on.

———————————–

After 11 years specialising in autism and treating hundreds of children, I absolutely believe that

…the children who make the greatest gains (and the fastest gains) are the ones whose parents and carers fully understand the unique differences of their child and know how to work with these individual characteristics, for maximum effect to help their child reach their full potential.

I have witnessed this time and time again.

So in order to interact with your child effectively and determine the best methods for managing their individual behaviours (eg: not weeing on the toilet, not socialising with peers, not eating a range of foods etc) you really need to understand your child’s individual sensory, emotional, thought processing patterns and learning style. Without this understanding, you will simply be guessing as to the best (and most suitable) methods of addressing particular behaviours with your child.

So what do you do…?

How do we help them with these issues…??

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My “Magic Formula”

The good news is that I have developed a magic formula of sorts… although with less magic and much more formula.

And although some of my clients might believe that I have a bunch of magic tricks up my sleeve,
the reality is that this formula involves no magic but rather…

…a well structured, methodical and individualised process, that systematically uncovers the underlying cause of ‘problem’ behaviours, enabling us to identify the most appropriate strategies and methods for treating them.

This process can be used with any child to target virtually any kind of behavioural issue.

I have never publicised this formula or the essence of my treatment model until now…

It is something I have only ever shared with my clients and those of you who already have my Autism Essentials Training Program.

But I know that unless I do share it with you, you will never fully understand why it is so important and how it forms the foundations for everything else that I do in the treatment of children with autism.

So let me introduce you to my Magic Formula… which I call the ‘Connect Therapy Pyramid’.

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The Connect Therapy Pyramid

I developed this formula and treatment model gradually over many years of working with children with autism and now use it everyday in the work that I do with the families I treat.

Whenever we have a problem behaviour that we are trying to target with a particular child we pull out the Connect Therapy Pyramid and work out systematically what is going on for the child.

I know it looks incredibly simple. But believe me, when used correctly it can be very powerful.

Each level of the pyramid is interconnected, starting from SENSE, then working all the way up through FEEL, THINK and LEARN, and finally arriving at BEHAVE at the very top of the pyramid.


Behaviour is only the tip of the iceberg

Imagine the pyramid is an iceberg. Your child’s behaviours are just the tip of the iceberg. They are what everybody sees on the surface.

But what we can’t see is the other 90% of the iceberg submerged beneath the water. What most people don’t realise is that they key to treating your child’s behaviours lies in being aware of and understanding the foundation skills and developmental deficits that make up the other 90% of the iceberg.



Example Case Study

Let me explain this by working through an example of how we would use the pyramid in practice.

Please note that even though the example I’ve chosen below looks at feeding issues, the formula can be used with virtually any challenging issue or behaviour that your child is experiencing.

Lets pretend that Jack is a very picky eater and will only eat home made chips, bread and banana. So the ‘behaviour’ we are trying to improve is getting Jack to eat a wider variety of foods.

But in order to treat the behaviour, we first need to understand why it is occurring.

It’s no good starting at the top of the pyramid, pouring all your efforts into treating the actual behaviour. We can’t waste time merely treating the symptoms of the problem (the tip of the iceberg) without actually understanding the cause of why it is happening.

For this reason, you must always start at the bottom of the pyramid with Sense, and work your way up.

As you become more competent at understanding your child at each of the different levels, the order in which you work can become more flexible. However you must ALWAYS analyse each of the lower levels first, before moving up to Behave.

• Step 1 therefore is to take into consideration whether there are any sensory motor challenges. It could be possible that Jack has a sensory processing issue. This could be based on either touch, visual (only feels safe eating certain coloured foods?), auditory (may not like the sound of crunchy foods?) or smell related issues. It may also be possible that Jack has an oral propriocpetive challenge where he does not have a good sense of where his tongue, lips and jaw are positioned and how they move which could mean that certain types of food are more challenging to eat than others.

• Step 2 is to consider what might be going on emotionally for Jack, what he is ‘feeling’ when he tries to eat new foods. It may be causing him an enormous amount of anxiety which means that meal time is extremely stressful for him. As we learned last week, if Jack is operating in a stressful state then he is unable to use the ‘thinking’ part of his brain to learn how to eat new foods. So until this is managed effectively there will be little change in his progress.

• Step 3 is to understand and consider whether Jack’s thought processing patterns are getting in the way of him trialing new foods. He may be very rigid and lack flexibility in the way he thinks. In this instance it is so important to build a warm and trusting relationship into mealtimes so that Jack feels very reassured and supported to take a few risks. But when doing this, it is also vital that the family know how to create the ‘just right’ challenge for Jack. If the challenge is too easy, he probably won’t be interested. If it is too difficult he might breakdown.

• Step 4 is to establish Jack’s learning style so that this can be taken into consideration when helping Jack work through this problem area. This is a very big area of analysis and involves understanding the auditory, visual and kinesthetic learning possibilities for Jack.



Finally, when we have dealt with each of the levels below, we can look at Jack’s behaviour and confidently choose the best strategies to help Jack with eating a wider variety of foods because we have a thorough understanding of the underlying issues causing this behaviour in the first place.

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So there you have it.
My ‘Autism Formula’.

I’ll be talking about it more in the weeks to come but right now this post is getting quite long, so I need to wrap it up…

I have only BRIEFLY touched on some of the possibilities for using this formula in the case study above to give you an idea of how this technique can be used to fully support your child’s development and learning. Hopefully you will have also gained a sense of how individualised and powerful this process can be for working with the unique differences of each individual child.

This treatment model is also very respectful (and fun!) for the child because it celebrates the fact that all children are unique and deserve individualised treatment and uses their natural motivations and strengths to help them learn more quickly.

If you’re interested in further training on using these methods to better understand and help your child then I’d recommend that you take a closer look at my Autism Essentials Training Series.  I specifically developed this program based on the fundamental principals of the Connect Therapy Pyramid. It covers each level of the pyramid in detail, beginning with SENSE then moving up through FEEL, THINK, LEARN and finally BEHAVE, teaching you how to understand and help your child at each stage.

To see how empowered and confident families become when they gain this incredible understanding of their child makes my work so rewarding.

At the end of the day it does not matter whether I have the skills to help the child. I consider it my job to hand over these tools to the parents and carers so they feel that they know how to tackle the various issues that arise. Only then do I feel that I have done a good job with the child and family!

Until next time. Happy connecting!

Best wishes
Monique

PS: Did this make sense to you? I hope that this has really enlightened many of you on the underlying principals and techniques behind my work. I’d love to hear your feedback or comments on my ‘Autism Formula’, so please leave me you thoughts below.

Related posts:

1. 7 tips for disciplining children with autism
2. One Habit to Avoid for Better Communication
3. “My child wants to socialise with other kids but doesn’t know how”

Firstly, welcome to our new readers out there!

I thought I would share with you an email that I received from one of my clients. This topic is something that I am dealing with on a day to day basis in my work so I thought that it would be very relevant for many of you.

How many of you would love your child to be able to sit down and concentrate on a game, activity or piece of work for longer than minute or perhaps even a few seconds!???

Then Henry’s mum’s story will probably sound familiar to you…

“Thank you for putting together the Autism Essentials pack it has indeed helped us with our son Henry. We are going ok implementing the sensory diet but Henry is very physical and seeks movement activities all the time. So when we want to do something “low key” (eg: a puzzle) he really lacks interest and the balance between the two is hard to establish”

So what is a Sensory Diet and what can you do in these situations to help your child?

If you already have my DVD Training Program then you’ll know what we’re talking about…but it doesn’t hurt to go over it again .

Each of us is born with a unique central nervous system and we use this system to help us to receive and process all the visual, auditory, touch, movement etc sensations that we come across in our environment. We basically use this information to help us make sense of the world around us.

Many children with autism are challenged in the area of sensory processing which often means that their bodies are “out of sync” and a lot of their time needs to be spent trying to make sense of all the incoming signals. This takes a lot of energy and often means that your child is distracted from what you are trying to teach them because they are focusing on something else.

If you don’t spend time addressing your child’s sensory challenges then this will undoubtedly affect your child’s ability to maintain attention, socialise and communicate with others and thrive in their preschool or school environments.

But I am here to tell you that it is very possible to help your child’s sensory system mature.

Here are the steps…

1. Discover which of your child’s sensory systems is impacting upon their learning (ie touch, movement, proprioception, auditory, visual or a combination).
2. Begin trialing a range of activities to help mature your child’s sensory systems.
3. Develop a sensory diet which is a planned schedule of specific sensory activities to be carried out at specific times by your child’s team. This will create results in the fastest way possible because you are all working together.

For help understanding and implementing these strategies please take a look at my ‘SENSE’ Training DVDs

So now let’s revisit Henry’s situation and see how these steps would be used.

One thing that we know about Henry’s central nervous system is that it needs a lot of movement input. At the moment he really seeks this type of input and his mum has reported that physical play generates a lot of wonderful connection. This also means that this kind of play is very ‘organising’ for his nervous system because otherwise he would find it hard to engage with her.

Henry’s mum has put together a sensory diet for him which they are carrying out with him on a daily basis to help fast track the maturation of his movement (vestibular) sensory system. This is wonderful and exactly what he needs.

What Henry’s mum will notice is that by implementing and revising his ‘sensory diet’, his nervous system will slowly but surely no longer seek excessive amounts of this input. As a result he will naturally want to engage in less physical play and will enjoy other activities like puzzles, reading of books, play-dough, imaginary play etc.

But for now, Henry’s mum should use movement as a foundation for the game but introduce other ideas like puppets, bubbles, balloons, songs, favourite characters, balls etc to try and expand the play sequences and target other goals (whatever motivates Henry). She may also find that by starting her play in a physical way that after a period of time he naturally wants a ‘more low key’ activity because his nervous system is calm and organised.

For all of you out there, there is no point fighting your child’s nervous system. It will just make you feel like you’re not getting anywhere. You must go back and treat these fundamental challenges because they simply don’t go away over time.

Please spend some time becoming more informed about your unique child’s nervous system so that you can use this information to help them reach their full potential.

For help with these strategies you might want to take a look at my ‘SENSE’ Training DVDs

Please stay tuned for the next message with my thoughts on discipline with children with ASD.

Until then, best wishes
Monique

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