← The Autism Little Learners Podcast
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For autistic children, the world can sometimes feel confusing and unpredictable. Visual schedules serve as lighthouses, providing a clear visual pathway through the daily fog of activities. These powerful tools not only enhance comprehension and independence, but also reduce anxiety and ease transitions. Let's explore the types of visual schedules, how to select symbols, and how to determine the optimal schedule length for your child or student. Hi, I'm Tara and this is the Autism Little Learners Podcast. I am a speech language pathologist with a twist. I've run my own communication based classroom for over two decades and I'm so excited to share actionable tips and strategies for supporting young autistic children. My goal is to help you feel more confident and successful when teaching your autistic child or students at the early childhood level. If you are ready to learn some tried and true strategies that really work, this is the podcast for you. Let's get Started welcome back to the Autism Little Learners Podcast. I'm thrilled to be chatting today about visual schedules because they're my jam. So many of you have messaged me saying that you want to use visual schedules consistently, but it can be really hard to know what type of visual schedule to start with for 3 and 4 year olds. Plus it can be really difficult to implement them consistently in a busy preschool classroom. Today I'm going to share some things to think about when it comes to finding the just right visual schedule for your child or student. I'll also share a couple of tips that can help you get started. Let's start with symbol selection for visual schedules and what I mean by symbol selection is choosing between pictures or objects to put on the visual schedule. Let's go through the options one by one. First, my go to when I get started with a student is by using what we call light line drawings. This might be more abstract line drawings like the ones in Board Maker, Smarty Symbols or Lesson Picks. They can also include clip art like the visuals I created just for visual schedules. Clipart pictures are kind of like cartoon drawings. I created a set using clip art because these pictures are a little more realistic, more colorful and more engaging. I'm going to link my visual schedule sets in the show notes for you to take a look at if you want to. The reason I start with line drawing symbols is because you can usually use these with most of your students and this makes pictures easier to organize and access and takes less ongoing prep time if after at least six weeks of implementation you have a student who doesn't seem to be understanding or making the connection with this type of symbol you might want to consider using real pictures for that child. So out of a class of, say, 10 students, you might only have one that needs you to differentiate the type of symbol used. Real pictures are exactly what they sound like. You take real pictures of locations, activities, and things the child will be engaging in during the day at school. That might be snack time, circle time, recess, gym class, bus. At home, it might look like a picture of the car D, table, bedroom, bathroom, grocery store, McDonald's, or any other places you go in the community. Real pictures are less abstract and can be easier for young children to understand. It's okay to have a mix of line drawings and real pictures. Whatever works for each individual child is the way to go. If real pictures aren't resonating with a child, try a functional object schedule. This involves using actual items like a spoon for mealtime as symbols for the schedule. You can literally Velcro items onto the schedule. This type of schedule is best for children who understand objects better than pictures and can relate the object directly to the activity. Another type of object schedule involves using miniature versions of objects to represent activities. Like a toy car means traveling, or a mini toilet from a dollhouse is used to represent that it's time to go to the bathroom. This type is best for children who can generalize from a smaller replica to the real world scenario. Object schedules can take more time to prep since you have to find the objects to represent each location or activity. Remember, it's okay to start small and find a couple of objects to start with. Maybe a spoon for snack or a wrapper of that child's favorite snack. A little chair from a dollhouse to represent circle time, or a toy car to represent meeting a parent at the pickup line. Choose maybe three to start and expand from there as you find objects that will work. There are a couple different ways to attach an object to a schedule, and I'll be going into more detail about those during an upcoming training. If you are interested in this, shoot me an email@autismlittlelearnersmail.com and let me know that you'd like more information about it. For children who can read, a schedule with simple written words or short sentences can work too. This type of schedule is best for literate children who can comprehend and follow some written directions. Choosing the right symbols on a visual schedule requires careful consideration. Here's a helpful flowchart process to guide your selection. First, start with line drawings or clip art and take time to see if the child starts to understand them. Next, if the child struggles, consider shifting to less abstract symbols like real photographs, functional objects, or mini objects. Third, evaluate the child's ability to match pictures to pictures, pictures to objects, or objects to objects to gauge their comprehension level. And remember, the goal is to find the most meaningful type of symbol for that child, which may involve some trial and error. Next, let's chat about the length of the schedule. Too often we feel like we need to have the full day laid out on a visual schedule, but this can be really overwhelming for so many of our little ones. Also, they often think it's a choice board and jump right to the picture of their favorite activity and then can only focus on that. And this leads to meltdowns and stress. So I encourage you to really think about the length of the schedule and not just start with a full day schedule. The length of the visual schedule should align with the child's attention span and ability to process information. When I have a new three year old autistic student, I almost always start with one picture on the schedule. This way you can model and narrate where you're going or what is next for each transition. This is a great place to start. Whether you are using pictures or objects. You might be asking, if it's only one picture, why would I put it on a schedule instead of showing them the single picture? Well, that's because we want to start creating a predictable routine for checking the schedule and this will help them get familiar with their schedule, what it looks like and where it is in the classroom. And this is what creates the predictable routine. Then as you get to know the child better and as they understand pictures better, you can start to add more pictures or objects, first starting with two and then moving up to three and then four and then you're on your way to a partial day schedule. Be sure to resist the urge to go too fast with this. Some of my students stay on a one picture schedule for the entire school year and that's okay. And some are up to four or five pictures by the end of the school year. You guys, it's so individual and it's really based on what's best for each child. Short term schedules show only a few steps at a time and are best for beginners or children who can get overwhelmed by too much information. So this is where we show two or more pictures or objects at a time on the visual schedule. Half day schedules provide information about the first half of the day and they're really good for students who understand a sequence of several pictures. But a full day schedule might be too much a Full day schedule provides an overview of the entire day and these are suitable for children who benefit from knowing what to expect and can handle more information at once. I've had children at the elementary level get to this point. Once they understood that the visual schedule represents a sequence of their day and is not a choice board, they are ready for this length. For some kids, the full day schedule can actually reduce anxiety. I had one student who was so anxious about when is mom going to come? When is mom coming? Once we implemented a full day schedule and we had a picture of his mom at the end, he stopped asking us when she was coming and he used to ask dozens of times each day so it really eased his anxiety to see everything that was coming throughout the day. Another variation is the use of a portable schedule. These can be carried around and they're useful for outings and maybe more unstructured times. Implementation starts small, perhaps a short sequence, and then expands as the child grows more accustomed to the system. And like we talked about before, when they're ready for more pictures on the schedule. This type of schedule works really great when you're in an integrated classroom setting. Visual schedules are a customizable tool to bridge the gap between the chaotic and unpredictable sequence of events each day and the structure that helps autistic children thrive. By carefully selecting the type of schedule, symbols and length, parents and educators can create a system that significantly enhances a child's ability to navigate their day with with less anxiety and increasing independence. As you embark on this journey, remember that patience and persistence are your allies with each picture, object or word. You're not just building a schedule, you're building a child's autonomy and peace of mind. I have a huge favor to ask of you. If you find this podcast helpful, will you take just a minute and leave a five star rating? Even better if you can leave a written review, I would be so grateful to you. This helps more educators and parents find the Autism Little Learners Podcast thank you so much. Here's a quote to think about this week when working with an autistic child. I need to talk more. Nope. Talk louder. No. Talk closer. Nope. Talk slower. No. Use visuals. Yes. Thank you for joining me today. I'll see you next week, same time, same place. I'm sending a big virtual hug your way because you just finished another episode of the Autism Little Learners Podcast. Thank you so much for listening. If you enjoyed this episode and you'd like to help support the podcast, please share it with others, post about it on social media, or leave a rating and review. If you have had success with any of the strategies that you learned about in this podcast, I would love to hear from you. Send me a DM on Instagram or Facebook. Autismlittlelearners don't forget to grab your free visual support starter set by going to autismlittlelearners.com visuals and always remember to find the good in every day. It.