Guest Post! How to make a schedule for a child with Autism

Today we have a guest post from Meg Proctor, an occupational therapist and autism specialist; focusing on schedule creation. Check her out www.learnplaythrive.com and sign up for her mailing list, or follow her on Facebook at facebook.com/MegProctorOT for more help with schedules and other daily routines.

Schedules:

If you’ve ever tried to make a schedule for a child with autism, you may have started out strong and then suddenly had lots of questions. Should I use pictures? Words? What should my child actually do with the schedule? What happens when it needs to change?

This infographic walks you through some of the questions you can ask your self, as you individualise a schedule for your child’s learning style. I always recommend that families make the first draft “quick and dirty” in case you need to make changes. For most of us, once you laminate everything and make it pretty it’s hard to want to make changes.

Making a schedule can be a trial and error process. But once you make it, try teaching it to your child over the course of a few weeks and see what happens! If it works for them, you should see transitions start to get easier, and daily life may develop a new, relaxed rhythm.

Infographic:

Check out our blog post that builds on Meg’s ingorgraphic about Why Therapists want me to use visuals at home here.

For a range of free visuals check out our page here. 

I’m Meg Proctor, an occupational therapist and autism specialist. I do online occupational therapy and parent coaching for families in Mississippi and North Carolina (coming soon to California!). Check out www.learnplaythrive.com and sign up for my mailing list, or follow me on Facebook at facebook.com/MegProctorOT for more help with schedules and other daily routines. Feel free to share my infographic on your own site (I just ask you include a link back to my website!).

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