Autism Tank: Restaurant Dining Experience

Monday, December 10, 2012

Restaurant Dining Experience

We often take our community trips to food-related places (my kids love to eat!). But seriously, you can practice so many skills on these kind of trips (i.e. $-skills, social skills, communication with strangers, manners, etc.). Not only are these trips a blast for the kids, but the parents appreciate the help as well. We have had so many parents tell us how the skills we work on during our community trips carry over to time spent in the community with their families. This allows our students' families to do more activities that typical families do....like go out to eat.

In my first couple years of teaching, we went mostly to fast food places and all the places basically had the same set-up (i.e. stand in line, order/pay, stand/wait for food, bring tray to table, eat, and leave). My kids got very good at this and their independence in ordering and ability to wait for short periods of line increased! So, we decided to up the ante. Why not try a sit down restaurant?! Let me tell you, some of my kids had NEVER been to a sit down restaurant before. It was quite interesting watching them experience it for the first time! For instance, when one of my students finished his meal, he tried to clear the table himself.

So today, we continued the tradition of our trip to a sit down restaurant and again my kids had a blast. It came up so quickly, I kind of forgot to prep my new students for this trip, but they still did fabulous. The restaurant has pretty much everything a kid could want from chicken tenders and burgers, to pancakes and waffles. For my students who can read, they ordered off the normal menu. For my students who can't read, I created this little photo menu for them to choose from.

I also have a PECS book with me for my nonverbal students so they can still practice ordering independently (the employees at this place are so accommodating!)