My name is Hailey, and I am a schedule addict! How many of you have students with individualized schedules for your students? How many of you know the pain of setting up a Velcro schedule every day for every student?! As much as I LOVE Velcro schedules and they work wonders for so many of our students, I LOVE LOVE it when I can get my kids to transition to a more functional picture or word schedule!
A few weeks ago, 3 of my students went from a picture schedule like this…
I am always proud of my students when they transition from a more intrusive schedule to a more functional one (even if it still involves Velcro)! One of my students went from not being able to follow a schedule at all, to using extra large color-coded schedule on the wall, to a much smaller color-coded schedule in a binder.
From this...
To this...
Sometimes it seems easy to keep the same schedule in place all year or for all students. However, I think it is always important to be teaching our kids to follow more and more functional schedules. I often use following schedules as an IEP goal to promote independent functioning and explain to parents how they can use functional schedules even at home. Parents can write out a list of words or draw a few simple pictures to help explain a new routine or to to show a child when they will get a desired item/activity (i.e. first brush your teeth, then shower, then you get time on the iPad).
Also, don't forget to mix things up! Kids should definitely have their own, individualized daily schedule, but I think you should use a variety of schedules throughout your day just to help kids generalize these schedule following skills as well as to keep kids from being overly rigid with schedules. Here is our last minute, hand written schedules for our holiday party (no fancy pictures, no printer ink, and the kids had to share the schedule with their group members!).
These are fantastic! I am a P.E. teacher, and I work at a school for children with developmental disabilities (of course, about 95% are diagnosed with AU). It's still a VERY new school, with brand new teachers right out of college. I love the ideas and variety that you provide your students and your audience here on your bloggie; they give me and the new teachers amazing ideas! Thanks for your amazing work!
ReplyDeleteThis is a great post. I also am addicted to schedules and have 5 different types in my current classroom. I am struggling on how to move from velcro to a list (like you use for "Christian" above). In this example, what do you do if an activity needs to be swapped or changed? I find that in my room, things have to be able to be moved around on a pretty regular basis due to behaviors, materials being destroyed, etc. How do you handle this?
ReplyDeleteThanks for the post - and thanks for the overhead marker tip!!!! :)
Our schedule usually stays pretty consistent. When there are small changes, I usually just cross things off and write in the new activity…if there are bigger changes I usually provide them with a new "special" temporary schedule that I print out, or write up for the day. Hope that helps!
DeleteThere is a website called "SchKIDules" that makes magnetic schedules for kids. Pretty cool magnetic tiles to put on strips or boards and you can use the dey erase marker on them too. Www.autismschedules.com
ReplyDeleteI know it's silly, but you wouldn't want to post the first schedule (just the "my daily schedule" page with squares as a freebie on TPT would you? :) It'd be a simple time saver.
ReplyDeleteAnd is it bad to admit that as a teacher of students with autism, this is one area I'm terrible at?! I just can't seem to keep visual schedules going, and can't get my TA to buy into it. If I tell a student "time for lunch" and he gets up to get his lunch, his receptive language is great (she says). Any quick justifications/ behaviors you've seen be helped when given a picture schedule? I am very careful to keep our schedule on point everyday, so I do think that helps a lot, but I know they need visual schedules too. Thanks.
I would say that schedules help promote independence (we don't always want people telling our kids what is next) and create a more predictable environment for our kids. I don't necessarily think every kid has to "check their schedule" after every single activity. Some of my students memorize their schedule and they only check their schedules periodically throughout the day (which is totally functional). However, if they ever are unsure of what is going to be next, they have the schedule to help ease some anxiety. And learning to follow a schedule will hopefully lead to other "following directions/steps" skills later in life such as a checklist of job tasks. Hope that helps!
ReplyDeleteThat's definitely helpful. Thank you!
DeleteVery good ideas! To anonymous-as a parent, it is very helpful to keep sensory/anxiety issues below the threshold which helps boost independence, confidence and function. Something as simple as doing it or doing it half way for my son, or a TA not "buying" into something set my son back 3 days once. There is a reason for these things--they work awesome and when you live in their world 24/7 you see this (I go to school w/my kiddo yet). =) PS It drives me crazy when a TA thinks they know more than a special education/early childhood certified teacher!!
ReplyDeleteAwesome its good work, we should create a more predictable environment for our kids.
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