Call me Cynical.... But this stuff on the news about Lego Therapy and Autism....

[ClutterJunkie]

isn't it just a bit obvious that lego and Autism go together ? (you know...the way that lego is predictable, uniformly shaped...can be symetrical...can be chewed...bright stimulating colours...and 'amazingly' the discovery that if you put a big pile of lego on a table autistic children play together (yes...says me...until one of them takes the red brick that the other one was about to use...or starts spinning the wheels...instead of fitting them to cars....)

(yes i've had a stressful few days...as we all have...and I may just be nit picking at this....)

but when i googled "Lego/ Autism"...and clicked the NAS link.... suprise suprise...Lego are one of the NAS's sponsers....so what a great way to 'advertise lego'....

If anyone has not heard of this latest 'miraculaous way to help autistic children interact socially' ...i will post a link!!!

They even featured a Doctor/author...that they quoted as having written a book called 'Defeating Autism"... and that immediately set my blood boiling...as they were 'once again' implying what we all know is impossible....and not stressing the way we all use strategies to manage and live WITH autism...NOT rid oourselves of IT

so ...i googled the doctor's book...and am pretty certain he shares MY thoughts...as the book is actually titled "Defeating Autism, A Damaging Delusion".....

yet again the media have edited and tweaked it all to suit their rose tinted 'feel good story'

Grrrr and bloody Grrrrr!

oh I saw something about this a while back - nothing recently though - all we need now is thomas the tank engine lego to be featured for stereotype bingo . Seriously - I'ld be very about any sort of general application of this - as surely some kids with ASD wouldn't be motivated to join in and others wouldn't have good enough motor skills to enjoy doing this.

I haven't seen the link.

I have an AS DS and he isn't much interested in Lego I have to say, so I can't see it working. It can require manual dexterity he doesn't have and he can never think what to build or how to build it.

He occasionally plays it with his brother but they fight over the pieces as you say. Usually DS2 has an idea and then DS1 wants to copy but of course they can't both use the same piece!

Funnily enough though DS (who may or may not be on the spectrum) according to paed last year probably not but I'm sceptical - would love that sort of group - he's very sociable and having such an obvious focus of conversation would be helpful to him, given his language problems.

yes...and i'm expecting my mum to offer me the advice that always follows news reports like this...this time being..."if you buy your boys some lego....they will be cured"

(None of mine have ever passed the duplo stage of lego...non of them could manipulate and take apart the small bricks of standard lego...so i never bothered keeping ours

i just don' see what is so special about lego...you could run this 'therapy' with Brio, Knex, Meccano etc....as long as had enough adults to 'guide the social interaction'

My 9 yr old still loves brio...and has heaps of tomica too...and yes...with my supports can intereact and play WITH another child....but walk away and the interaction goes pretty fast!!!

DS isn't really very good at proper lego, he likes putting the little men together, anything harder I end up doing!

Lego's probably more fun for the adults though , my mum is desperate to take Ds to Legoland LOL.

this is about the therapy... and wasn't mentioned on the news either!!!

here's the Times News report (from october) which i'm sure they used to make the news report i saw tonight

and if you read it it quotes
"One child acted as the ?engineer? and described the instructions, another as the ?supplier? finding the correct pieces, and the ?builder? put the pieces together. After a time, they would swap roles. Later, they would play ?freestyle? in pairs, designing and building a model space rocket, for example, which allowed them to practise compromise, express their ideas clearly and take others' ideas into account.

Children started off building quick and easy models in pairs or threes with constant adult supervision before moving on to more complex models. All the while, they played according to Lego club rules, such as: if you break something, you fix it or ask for help; if someone else is using it, ask first before taking it; no yelling - keep your hands and feet to yourself.

Within weeks, Brian had changed from a confused boy without friends to a confident child. ?By the end of the study, he was much happier at school - happy to stand up for himself and go and talk to people, even if they didn't want to talk to him,? says Gail. ?He made friends at Lego club, which was great, and later met up to play at their houses, which was a big deal because at school he'd not been invited to parties.?

mine never really worked out the way to stagger the bricks to make them overlap- to make a strong structure.

ds3 likes simply fixing a single layer of bricks on a base board to cover it...or making a 'hamster playground' for his hamster to climb on.

sounds like it's v. high functioning kids the research was on, doesn't it?

Yes totalchaos!

I reckon they made this news item around the time that it was in the newspapers...and then today...cos they had a gap in the news that they couldn't fill with current news...they searched their archives for a film that had a duration of exactly the right length to fit their slot!!!

(I am extremely grumpy today...so another day i may have perceived this differently!!!!)

I suppose the upside is - though in a way it's obvious, it may help m/s schools to see that taking advantage of special interests in a safe group setting can really help kids who are struggling socially for whatever reason.

yes...that's my idea of real'inclusion'!
(involving NT with SN type activities...as oppsed to schools insistence to force our SN children to adapt to NT ways!!!)

clutter - do you still have my e-mail addy - would like a chat offboard - nothing "heavy" - just about having kids in m/s without support.

My two aren't really all that interested in Lego. I don't think ds1's fine motor skills are up to it and ds2 just isn't bothered. One year they got a Lego Star Wars toy to build. They both loved it but had no desire to build it, so me and dh made it instead.

My ds loves lego, never noticed it's miracle qualities though!

This is childish, but I couldn't help noticing that the Dr in Clutters first link is Dr Dan LEGOff.

Mind you when he was in mainstream reception he was very fond of the construction activities and seemed far more 'included' at those times. It's probably no coincidence that he got more and more excluded as the school work got less pratical. He could probably blend quite well at Lego club but I don't think it would have a massive impact outside the subject.

(thank goodness he isn't called Dr LegOVER!!!)

I don't like the fact that after reading about this I am now stressing that maybe we aren't making the most of his love of Lego.

Tee hee

I used to love lego as a child, for years every birthday I'd ask for it as a present. DS1 loves playing with it as well.

Saw this on the news this evening and was a bit At school we have various building things for the kids to play with such as knex, wodden train sets and yes LEGO. Perhaps we should do away with all the other toys and just keep the lego

I have 3 lego addicts- and I include very NT ds2 and Dh in that count. plus my nephews, sister, erm- probably a good proportion of the eople I know (NOT me, can't organise my ideas enough for the stuff. The child that isn't?

yup, ds3. The more severe of the asd duo.

Most kids are into lego; asd kids are still kids and so thats houldn't really be a surprise really.