Westman Child Development Centre

Accepting new clients now! Open to all children between the ages of 2 and 15, no diagnosis required. Sessions will start the week of September 14th. To register, contact Wendy at [email protected]

Activity: Sequencing Cards

Build your child's understanding of time, sequences, and organized thinking and help your child anticipate and plan
everyday activities.

Step by step

1) Choose 5 to 7 cards showing daily-routine scenes (e.g., waking up, eating breakfast, brushing teeth, going to
school, playing, having dinner, going to bed). You can find these online or take actual pictures of your child doing the steps and print them.
2) Shuffle the cards and present them to your child.
3) Ask your child to arrange the cards in the correct order of the day's events.
4) Encourage your child to say each step of the sequence out loud.
5) Reinforce understanding of the order and talk about why each step happens when it does.

Tips
Start with just a few cards and gradually increase the complexity. Use clear images that are familiar to your child

*For extra fun and silliness, try doing the actions backwards or out of order. This will help to reinforce the need for the correct order.

While listening to a story, encourage your child to stay alert for keywords or cues that trigger pre-agreed actions. This helps in practicing active listening and shifting attention.

Step by step

1) Choose a storybook appropriate for your child's age.
2) Pick keywords or phrases in the story that will be cues for certain actions (e.g., every time they hear 'bear,'
your child roars).
3) Explain the rules of the game to your child and the action that goes with each cue.
4) Read the story aloud, pausing for your child to do the actions.
5) Increase the number of cues and the complexity of the actions to make it more challenging.
6) To make it even more challenging for older children, add an inhibition challenge: a cue that your child must NOT react to.

Have fun and let your child create their own cues and actions if they like!

With summer holidays officially here, we wanted to share some fun activities to keep the kids busy over the summer! Watch for more future posts :-)

Activity: Gel Bag Drawing

A sensory activity that lets your child draw with their fingers on a soft, squishy surface without any mess.

Materials
• Sturdy zip-top plastic bag • Hair gel or thick tempera paint • Tape

Tips
Start with big, sweeping movements and then refine to smaller ones. Use different gel colors or add glitter for extra
visual input and fun.

Precautions
Check that the bag is well sealed to prevent leaks.

Steps:
1) Add a generous amount of hair gel or tempera paint inside the plastic bag.
2) Seal the bag tightly, pressing out as much air as possible.
3) Tape the bag down to a table or a clean, flat surface.
4) Encourage your child to use their fingers to make drawings and shapes in the gel through the bag.
5) Show them how to make lines, shapes, numbers, letters, pictures, etc.
6) Add small objects to the bag for extra fun if desired.

Visit our website at www.autismwestmancdc.com for more information on any of our programs or feel free to reach out by email to [email protected] or by phone to (204) 720-1472!

Due to renovations going on at PlaySkape this month, our sensory night will be postponed until July. A date will be posted as soon as we have one! Thank you for your patience and we hope to see everyone in July!