What do your autistic children enjoy?

[Thatsthatthen87]

My son is 10 and nonverbal. He loves anything 'messy' (currently playing with flour) but I'm really nervous about the holidays and how to keep him entertained at home as he can get really violent and destructive. Is anyone in a similar boat and has found something that their very autistic children have absolutely loved and been entertained for hours by? 😬

My son is younger (4) and not completely
non verbal but he loves water play (I set him up in the garden with numerous buckets, containers, pans, measuring spoons and plastic cups

marble runs. My son will spend all day just doing the marble run if I let him

bubbles

Playing in water has always been soothing for my son. A washing up bowl full in the garden with things to pour. We have a hot tub which he really enjoys (it’s just going up for the summer holidays this year, as we’re trying to reduce energy use).

Those beads you can buy that swell up in water are good and very cheap if he enjoys messy play.

Can you access anything through your local offer? DS3 used to go to a specialist play provision for a couple of days in the holiday, which was good for him and me.

My daughter 11 doesn’t like anything messy, she likes trampoline swing or iPad...

My non verbal daughter loves ice cubes! Anything sensory really

Maybe look at messy play ideas on a Tuff tray/spot Facebook group

Ds is 12 now but when he was younger he loved things that spinned, windmills, helicopters etc. Now he only talks about ww1 and ww2!

My son has academic “passions” - we prefer to say that than obsessions which sounds negative.

currently
temperatures around the world ( I am not a fan and am already bored and would like this to stop now please )

previously we had
volcanoes
maps
space
roof shapes
clocks
washing machines
Fonts (writing not baptismal)

I am very well educated on these topics.

he is very solo so likes running cycling and swimming but won’t even engage with team sports

he is an absolute hoot ❤️

Definitely going to try this!

We don't have a garden unfortunately but we do have a small outdoor space. He's really not good in the heat.

Mine is 10yo too, with ASD and other co-morbidities, and although he is verbal, he has cognitive impairment and learning disabilities, so there is some commonality between your son and mine.

Mine absolutely loves water. So on a warm day, he would love any of the following

To fill a watering can with water from a paddling pool and pour it anywhere and everywhere including on himself, but he likes to water the plants and the oaths too. And then he likes to watch the water drain away down an income or steps or whatever to see the oaths and patterns the water makes. He will watch this and use his fingers to make patterns with the water

As above, but will fill up the can or a jig from an outdoor tap (this obviously needs more supervision!)

Play with the water hose, using it to water the grass or fence or himself or spray other people (maybe one for just before bath time!)

Fill up water squeezers (bath toys) and spray them on the ground or on his toys

Wash his toy trains and cars in a bowl of water and make them nice and clean (it’s all about the process, not the result!)

Marks or drawings with chalks on paving stones or pavement

Painting - we have these big cardboard kits from hobbycraft and just let him loose on them in the garden

Painting again - he likes to paint himself, so again I just let him do that either with face paints and a brush or wash off paint and a brush and let him sit in his pants and he will paint himself green usually, to look like a frog

We also have a load of these paint your own sets from hobbycraft

He also likes building dens, using blankets and chairs and things like that

He also likes gathering things. So gathering stones or sticks from our (messy) garden and piling them up in a shady spot, which he used to liken to makka pakka’s stone house, or a three little pigs house

I’m conscious that lots of these are outdoor idea and I don’t know if you have outdoor space. If you don’t, some of the painting type things can be done on the kitchen floor or in the bath?

The bath is well used in this house for play, even in the day. We have lots of bath foam, the crackly things that you can put in the bath, bath bombs etc as well as squirters and pots and jugs and stuff. He takes lots of things into the bath like duplo, some plastics trains, balls etc.

An air conditioner is a REALLY good investment if you can swing it. White noise and a chill at night time will lead to better day times.

those plasticky “men” that you throw at a wall/door and then stick/slide down

marble run or basket ball hoops

pingpong ball on a stick (Amazon it’s for practice but basically you can tap it continuously)
similarly swing ball

hex bugs and the swimming fish

different things in the sand pit (ours is just a big under bed box add cornstarch and baby oil for magic sand) eg little houses and cars, dinosaurs, diggers, trees and animals, moulds.

that elephant game with the butterflies

nerf guns and a target

a money sorting machine for change and a handful of coins

remote control things

we have a herd of Christmas decorations that repeats whatever sounds you make a few seconds later and get a good crazy echo thing going on

DS is 8. When he was younger he really loved messy sensory seeking stuff. He would spend all day in the garden in all weathers, playing with water, gravel, chipped bark, mud. It was not unusual to see him sitting IN his water table during a freezing, torrential storm, throwing gravel in the air and letting it fall onto his face with his eyes shut 😁Or stomping up and down on gravel then mud then gravel, then mud etc with no shoes on. He still does love this, but not as much as he used to. Can you get lots of natural type materials he can play with outside? Kind of extend what he already likes, but requiring less cleanup?

Now ds is into quantum physics equations. He copies them out and memorises them all, and writes them over and over again on any paper he can get his hands on.
He's also been into shapes, languages, alphabets of different languages, fruits, vegetables and herbs, countries, flags, numbers, maths equations, volcanoes, bees, space, planets, super Mario, old 80s games and consoles, music, heavy metal/rock music, calligraphy. Basically he gets interested in something and becomes expert in it, then moves onto the next thing.

What about a jelly bath?

Making slime

My dd (9yrs) isn’t great outside so although we have a garden she is rarely out. We do a lot of crafts, cutting with different shaped scissors and cut out stamps (very supervised as she will cut her clothes etc), modelling with clay, painting, iPad art (she has an app called pro-create).

We also bake, do bath play, board games (orchard games are great for her), (re)watch some films and have done the cinema. We also look at lots of pictures of ducks.

We’re into week 3 of the holidays and it’s going well so far, we even managed to eat out yesterday which is usually a bit stressful.

Things to throw - try ping pong balls to avoid damage/injury

Water play as PPs have said.

Bring on a spectrum means your child is unique. Try things, random things like foam spray or mud play may go down well or be hated!

The little one I work with isn't massively into messy play but loves magnet tiles, magnetic numbers and long walks.

Mines 3 in September but she doesn’t have learning difficulties, although, like many autistics she does have ADHD so needs a lot of stimulation.

My LO is a typical toddler, she likes going to the park, playing with her small world toys, going to the zoo, crafting etc. Life’s a lot easier if I take her out as much as possible. I try and get her to do a lot of high energy activities to calm down the ADHD, in our case this is soft play, bouncing on the trampoline and playing chase. She also likes covering herself in a lavender roll on which helps to calm her down.

There was a giant kind of marble run in John Lewis the other day that was reduced.

It may not be helpful but my chap took to computers like a duck to water and takes delight in both playing video games to completion (over and over), playing things like mario karts and smash bros obsessively (and would even play with me and later little brother) before moving onto games like skyrim and fallout 4 when older. It also allowed him time and freedom to research his passions - he started working towards his Phd. in pokemon first.

But like a pp said all kids are different mine couldn't bear touching 'wet' and messy type stuff. But yeah for the hours and hours of happy contentment factor nothing beats video games - (also true of my adult brother).

My 11 year old who has moderate/severe autism plus another genetic disorder will spend hours looking at youtube videos of trains and roller-coaster rides. He also likes looking at books and repeating bits of stories. He hates messy play.

Some good ideas here, it's hard to get into his head, I don't know what it is he gets from the activities that keep him calm or I'd build on those. Like, he likes playing with flour and crumbled up bath bombs (and sugar but I'm not willing to indulge that really) but not kinetic sand, which to me makes more sense.

He likes being under a sheet or blanket so dens are a good idea, I like the ice cubes idea, I'm happy to take him to one of the many nearby parks but he does tend to take clothes off if they get wet and obviously I don't want that in public 😅

I'd be thrilled if he would get into Minecraft or something but he has limited understanding.

Interestingly though, I can take him to the cinema and he will sit and watch the film.

Also, does anyone else have a child who hurts them (and themselves) when upset? I don't know how to deal with this other than by avoiding upsetting him which is difficult sometimes and he's obviously getting bigger and stronger now.

You son sounds amazing - I would find almost all of those (not sure about washing machines) really interesting too.
I LOVE learning temperatures around the world.

sometimes having a small safe place can be very comforting and can avoid getting to that crisis stage. You can actually buy them - Google safe spaces, or make something yourself.
has he got a SaLT? Ask them for advice or ask for a referral if he hasn’t got one.

DS1 has always hated anything messy/sticky, but has loved anything that you build since he was tiny. As a toddler he would spend hours just stacking cups/blocks and knocking them down, then progressed onto mega blocks and Duplo. Now, at ten, he spends his time on complex Lego and Meccano sets, the science museum engineering kits, and creating chain reaction runs all over his bedroom.

DS2 has always been much more sensory seeking, particularly anything bubbly or foamy. He's 8 now, and will still happily sit with his bubble machine on catching bubbles and feeling them pop on his hands.