As I mentioned in yesterday’s post, April is Autism Awareness Month. Today we celebrate “Light It Up Blue” with Autism Speaks to help spread worldwide awareness!
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| How are you lighting it up blue today?! |
In honor of Light It Up Blue, I wanted to share some freebies to use with your kiddos that have autism!
This is a great resource for your kiddos with autism (or even some of your other students with varying disabilities!). Rather than just sending home a teacher-written home note, this gets your students more involved in the process and gives them a way to tell their parents how their day was and what they did at school! You can download it for free HERE!
Another awesome resource to have in your classroom is an “I’m working for” system. Most of my students have a 3 thumb chart where they either earn 3 thumbs as they work, OR they lose a thumb if they are not working, listening, etc. Obviously, most teachers and therapists believe in the positive rewards system, but sometimes you have students that just don’t care about that, yet they REALLY don’t want to lose any of their thumbs/stars/whatever their token is! One of my students will “lose a thumb” and will immediately turn it around. It is pretty rare that a thumb has to be taken!
These are just some of the rewards you can use. A hot ticket item in my classroom is our Wii or our iPad! What I do is laminate a file folder and on the outside, put the “I am working for:” section. The different rewards choices are laminated and put on velcro and kept on the inside of the file folder for easy access. The student will choose which reward they are working for, and place it in the top box on the file folder cover. There are also 3 “thumbs up” in this freebie that you place inside the 3 boxes on the front as they earn them, or take away, whichever works best for you. This freebie is used every day, all day in my classroom and can be a lifesaver! Click HERE to download!
I also found this great iPad App information on twitter from Smart Apps 4 Kids!
Free and Reduced Apps for Autism Awareness Month
Happy Tuesday and don’t forget to Light It Up Blue!!
