Tips for Teachers (from I.L.S.A. Conference)

by Sorcha Regan

Motor Skills Strategies

• Ten minutes of exercises every day.
• E.g. : Brain Gym; Star Jumps; Crab Walk; Wheelbarrow; Hokey Pokey; Hopscotch; Tag; Simon Says; Skipping; Hopping; Marching to Rhymes; Clapping.
• VERY SPECIFIC instructions are required!
• Start with ‘big’ activities – hips and shoulders
• Shoulders – two-handed exercise for two people; using a cardboard tube, bat a balloon back and forth
• Hips – same activity lying down
• Tummy – same activity lying down
• Throwing a silk scarf or other light material to one another
• Fishing game using a cardboard tube (two-handed) with string and magnet to pick up letters or fish – this can also be played in kneeling position
• Whiskers game – headband with magnet. First use hands for support and then with hands behind back
• Draw letters on your back – guess which letter
• Paint letters on the wall with water using big brush (outdoors)
• Tray with shaving foam – teacher makes letter and the child traces it and then copies teacher
• Making letters with chalk on carpet squares
• Unscrewing lids from bottles
• Pegs – brilliant for strengthening and improving hand function
• Game – use box with pegs attached. Start with big pegs and then use all sizes. Throw a dice and the child must remove the number of pegs thrown. Reverse and child must put pegs in.
• Trampoline – excellent for motor development and eye control
• Ball skills – start with big light beachballs or foam balls
• Position the child sitting on the floor with back to wall and practice throwing/rolling from this position. Repeat the same exercise kneeling and then standing.
• Use an apron as a ‘catcher’. Other catchers can be a bin or basket, a hoola-hoop with net attached. These catchers ensure success.
• Older children can play volleyball using a light ball, short-tennis and badminton
• Kicker-Flickers – attach ball to waist with string and practice kicking.

Spatial Awareness and Perceptual Strategies

• Spatial Awareness – Dyspraxic children have problems with social distance and constantly ‘invade your space’. Teach them to stay literally at arms length from the person they are talking to.
• Sequencing Exercises :-
• Sit in front of a mirror, side by side. Identify by pointing and outlining with the index finger all parts of the body from large/general to detailed.
• Stand with the child in the middle of the room and indicate by pointing certain features of the room e.g. the corner by the door, the wall with the window etc. Turn the child and ask him/her to indicate the same things from a new position.
• Begin with imitated hand and feet movements – clapping hands, right hand to left shoulder etc. Repeat with ears, knees, elbows etc. Draw around body outline and relate drawing to actual body parts.
• Sequence daily life – e.g. ask the child to name people around the table, scanning from left to right.
• Have name cards of each item of clothing, describe the movements required to dress.
• What do you do when you wash your hands, brush your teeth, lay the table etc.
• Practice days of the week, months, seasons etc.
• Count from 1-20.
• Repeat name, address, telephone no. etc.
• Music – march in time to rhythm – arms and legs co-ordinated.
• Ask child to close eyes and listen to a clock ticking, keys jangling, fingers tapping etc. Ask them to describe in a sentence what they heard.
• "You Say What I Say" – Hello, it’s a nice day; I’m tired; I’m hungry; I want to play; I would like some sweets; I would like to go shopping. Practice in different tenses.
• Frostig Programme of Visual Perception – useful to establish left/right etc/
• Visual Perception – working from the blackboard.
• This is a difficult skill for a child with visual copying difficulties and will have to be introduced in a structured way with additional support. Colour coding can be helpful. Use a green-red system. Write the first sentence in green chalk, second in orange and the last in red. Write or underline in coloured chalks those words which are constantly repeated in the text. This way, the child can look down to their page and back to the correct word/sentence they are copying and not to the same word elsewhere in the text on the board.

Pragmatic Language Strategies

• Engage in as much eye contact as possible.
• Charades – happy, sad, angry, frustrated.
• Discuss rules for touching another person.
• Traffic light system :
• Red- inappropriate behaviour – both verbal and non-verbal. Amber - behaviour and language for certain social settings e.g. meeting friends of parents, grandparents, other children, visiting other homes. Green– safe language and behaviour for all occasions.

Social Communication Strategies

• Introduce the child to the social hierarchy
• Inner zone – child, then …..
• Parents, close friends and family, peers, teachers and adult family friends, strangers.
• Help the child to understand what being socially able means – aggression, anger,
• fear etc.

Organisation and Time Management Strategies

• Plan the week with the child.
• Have board on wall with timetable of activities – use pictures if child is little
• Give plenty of notice for change in routine
• Remind child 10 minutes before next activity
• Use timer – give it to the child for different tasks e.g. perhaps set it for ten minutes for reading
• Mark shoes with an X on inside to match up
• Make sure child has a schoolbag with plenty of room for manoeuvre
• Have 3 see-through pencil cases – school, home and bag
• Use elastic loop to hang coat
• Different coloured covers for different subjects
• Use velcro and elastic shoelaces – who says they have to learn to tie laces?
• Use a ruler with a handle
• Use dycem to prevent ruler and books slipping
• Do not expect child to wait in line too long – maybe put him/her in front
• Write down homework for child – make sure they bring the relevant books
• Help children to develop a concept of time – this helps them to feel more in control.
• Start with an end goal – e.g. baking, shoelaces, going to the shop, motor activities etc.
• Use a calendar to mark off days and months of the year
• Have a buddy system or photocopy homework.

Handwriting

• Handwriting is a perceptual skill
• Posture is important
• Sloping surface is essential
• Child should be allowed to experiment with a variety of pencils and pens
• Try wrapping a pencil with ‘sill putty’
• A base line used from the early stages may be useful
• Use dycem to prevent copybook slipping
• Colour code e.g. a green dot to start and a red dot to finish
• Endless repetition of pre-writing skills
• Some experts encourage a cursive style
• Typewriters, word processors, dictaphones and computers are invaluable aids
• PCs in the classroom, palm pilots, alpha smart
• To test writing – child copies writing, teacher dictates, child writes, child writes
• Never place a left-handed child beside a right-handed child
• Handwriting is not an essential skill
• Useful computer programmes – Type to Learn, Clicker 4.

Maths

• Do not expect children with Dyspraxia to work out problems
• Accept his/her best effort
• Spend plenty of time on the basic skills
• Avoid graphs, angles etc – some children with Dyspraxia cannot draw boxes
• Five sums instead of ten
• Colour code – e.g. hundreds, tens and units – if you want them to start at U, colour the U green
• Expect difficulties with the concept of time
• Maths is a language e.g.
• 2 is smaller than 6 – how can that be?
• 2 into 8 – how does it go in?
• tables – how can tables be numbers?
• Number games played on the floor are very effective using big squares
• Numicon – maths kit very suitable for children with Dyspraxia – numbers are different shapes and only fit into the correct slot on the board. Ideally you should use 2 boards. School kits and home kits.
• Time concepts – walk to the shop. How long does it take? Time the journey.
• Timer – set for different lengths of time
• Sit quietly for 1 minute etc.

Reading

• Some children have difficulties with reading
• Problems with initial sounds – mechanics of phonics
• The whole word approach (look and say) seems to work better
• Use colour coding – green to start, red to finish
• This code can also be used for writing.