Ready to have a sensory safe Christmas in the Winter?
LifeSkills4Kids is based in Australia, but we know that some of our readers live on the other side of the world, where your Christmas will be considerably colder!
So, let’s take a look at preparing for a sensory safe Christmas during the winter months. There will of course be many similarities whether Christmas arrives in summer or winter time.  Have a look at our article about a Sensory Safe Christmas Day.

Top Tips for a Sensory Safe Christmas in Winter

Be Mindful of “The Winter Blues”

• Many of us can struggle to cope with the darker days and nights that winter can bring
• There is a lot of research around Seasonal Affected Disorder (SAD) which can lead to depression
• SAD can affect our kids too!  We all know what it is like when the weather is cold, wet and dreary – it can greatly effect your mood and make you feel sad, tired and unsociable
• As parents, we also know that if our kids get tired they are more likely to have meltdowns and experience sensory overload

Dealing with The Winter Blues

• Christmas time can assault the senses from EVERY angle!
• How do we help our young person to deal with Christmas when they may also be affected by SAD?
• These days there are many light therapy boxes available to help people with SAD – they do not claim to be a total cure, but they provide natural light during the winter months which can help alleviate feelings of tiredness and general lethargy
• There are also light boxes which can help you wake up, by simulating the dawn and therefore providing help to wake up naturally in the morning (even if it is still dark outside!)

A Sensory Safe Winter Christmas

Pre-Planning

• Make sure you involve your kids in all aspects of the planning of your activities at Christmas time
• Make a Christmas planner together – start the planner as soon as possible – so that your child has plenty of time to assimilate what is happening and prepare themselves for as many eventualities as possible
• Discuss with your young person where the trigger points might be and come up with plans together which could help them cope with these triggers
• Prepare your extended family and friends by letting them know what the triggers might be too and how they can help

Extended Family and Friends

• All of the people that care about you and your family will want to help make Christmas a wonderful time together
• Prepare them well in advance so that they can help make visits to their house as easy as possible
• Ask them to provide one or two foods that you know your child will like and ask them if they could keep a little space as a quiet place for your child to have a sensory time out if they need one

Winter Clothing

• You will know if your child has any issues with clothing types
• Make sure that you have winter clothing that is made with the right materials, with user-friendly labels and colours
• Make a game out of wearing gloves/hats/scarves and give your child lots of options and choices
• Winter clothing can be quite heavy – which is often good for children with sensory processing issues, the heavy clothes can mimic the same calming effect as a weighted blanket
• A weighted blanket can be a great way to help your child feel relaxed and chilled out when you are out and about.  You can take the blanket with you and use it for travelling and for visiting different venues at Christmas-time

Winter Activities

Whatever activities you plan to do over the Christmas holidays, it can be a great idea to do them with your child first before the holidays.  This can provide your child with a chance to practice and learn new skills in a safe environment.  When you repeat these activities in a slightly larger group, your child is much more likely to be able to cope.
For example, if you plan on going ice skating over the festive season (many towns have temporary ice rinks), your child can really benefit from checking out the area, the ice rink and having a go with just you and your close family.  This will give them the confidence to enjoy this activity in a larger group at a later date.  A pre-visit will also help to find out what triggers may be present, so that you can plan strategies to cope with them.

Decorations and Presents

• When you are decorating your house and your tree, it is really helpful if you can do this with your kids
• They will then be able to tell you if any of the decorations/lights are triggers for anxiety or sensory meltdowns
• Encourage your kids to make some decorations that feel safe and calm for them
• When you are opening presents, it is often really helpful for your kids with sensory issues to open one gift at a time.  This provides them with the opportunity to open presents in a methodical, calm manner.  It will take longer this way, but it will be much easier for all of you!
• Provide plenty of breaks when opening presents and be prepared for your child to withdraw into their safe space or use their sensory toolkit to help them get through this time.
• Opening presents can be a frantic experience – allow your kids to take their time, move at their pace and enjoy the day as much as possible

Social Stories at Christmas

• Creating a social story or several of them can be really helpful for your young person
• A social story can help them with cues about how to receive gifts; how to react when they are visiting the extended family and many other activities around Christmas
• If at all possible, create the social story together with your young person, so that they have valid input and feel that they are included in every aspect of the story

Other Articles from LifeSkills4Kids with more tips on surviving the holidays :

1. Reducing Anxiety for End of Term
2. A Sensory Safe Christmas
3. How to Transition from School to Home
4. Tips for Reducing Anxiety at Christmas
5. Creating A Sensory Safe Corner At Home
6. Helping Hyperactive & Busy Kids
7. Tips for Travelling with Children
8. Fireworks Survival Guide
9. Minimising Tantrums at the Shops

Written by Deb Hopper, Occupational Therapist

As an adult, finding ways to help your child with learning difficulties deal with anxiety is a vital part of enabling them to feel safe, secure and loved.  Young people who have learning difficulties need help, understanding and respect to allow them to thrive in their world.
How can you find out if your child is displaying signs of anxiety?  At Lifeskills4kids, we are passionate about helping our young people deal with being anxious.  For a deeper understanding of the impact of anxiety on your child’s happiness, have a look at this article.
Ok, so you think your child may be showing signs of anxiety, what can you do about it?

How to help your child with learning difficulties deal with anxiety

#1 Environment

A Sensory Safe Space (this could be a calm space or an active one)

• For further information about how important a safe space can be, have a look at our article on helping kids with anxiety.
• Remember that you can create a safe space wherever you want to – it could be at school, at home, in a special place on holiday or at a frequently visited place eg, grandparents home.
• Include elements from all of the five senses to help your child cope from a multi-sensory perspective.
• To help your child with learning difficulties deal with anxiety, decide if they would benefit from having a calm safe space or an active safe space.  Most kids will value having both options if it’s possible.
• Remember also to have clear agreed rules between yourself and your child, so that you both know who is allowed into the space and when it can be used.
• Check out our article on a child’s safe space.

#2 People

Kids with learning difficulties can take longer to process information and longer to learn to trust people.
It is important, to give your child the greatest chance of success in dealing with anxiety to build a team of familiar people around them.
All human beings thrive on love and it is important when kids are struggling with anxiety that they feel very safe, secure and loved within the team of people supporting them.
Another consideration for kids to feel safe is to agree throughout the team how to deal with each element of anxiety that the young person may be experiencing.  To be able to have an agreed strategy for each common anxiety will provide the young person with a clear and easy-to-read set of boundaries.

#3 Strategies

Pictures can be worth a thousand words

At LifeSkills4kids, we have several articles to help you with using visuals to help your child with learning difficulties deal with anxiety.
For more information, have a look here:

• Start here for a general overview of visuals (this article is specifically about kids with autism, but visuals can help ALL kids).
• Visuals can also be used to help emotional well-being for your child, which will help with anxiety.
• Visuals will also be covered in our article to be published on 19th April, it will turn up here on that date.

Sensory Toys & Familiar Objects

All kids have favourite toys and certain things that they will not leave the house without having with them.  Young people with learning difficulties are just the same – they might just need some help from you to remember to take these precious items with them.
There are a variety of sensory toys available that can also help your child with learning difficulties deal with anxiety.  You will need to experiment with different types of sensory toys to find out which ones your child is most comforted by.
Generally, light-up and spinning toys can help to make a child with learning difficulties less anxious. These sorts of toys will help the young person to ‘zone out’ of a stressful situation, by focusing instead on the toy.
It is also possible to buy chewy toys which can be very helpful too.  The monotony of chewing can also be a good way to focus on something else and having a chewy also provides the user with something to do with their hands.

Make a Sensory Goodie Bag

It can be a lifesaver for both you and your child to have a sensory goodie bag immediately available in every situation.
My recommendation would be, whenever you find toys/objects which calm and soothe your child, buy TWO of them!  One for immediate use and one to add to the Goodie Bag for any potentially stressful situation.

“Safety Blankets”

A great way to help your child with learning difficulties deal with anxiety is to use a weighted blanket or a large piece of lycra to wrap them in.  Sometimes, anxiety can be reduced by providing your child with the feeling of a ‘deep’ hug – weighted blankets and lycra are great tools to be able to achieve this feeling.  (They also have the added bonus of providing a deep hug without the direct involvement of a person, so that the young person does not have to give up their personal space).

Teaching Kids About Feelings

We have used the most current research to create our “Just Right Kids Technique”.  For more information on this, check out this article.  We looked at different models and took the most effective parts of each of them to design the Just Right Kids Technique.
We all want Just Right Kids – this is when your child’s emotional well-being is in the optimum space for whatever situation they are in.
The beauty of using Just Right Kids is that you can help your child with learning difficulties deal with anxiety by finding out about how they can manage their own feelings.

Get Help from Deb Hopper (Occupational Therapist & Blog Owner)

Workshops You Can Access:

• Sign up for Deb’s training workshop to help your child with learning difficulties deal with anxiety
• Check out Deb’s upcoming training on strategies to help with anxiety for kids with physical difficulties
• Look here for Deb’s workshop to help kids who have social anxiety issues

Written By Deb Hopper, Occupational Therapist
Do you struggle in supporting emotional well being at home for your ASD child?
As parents, we all want our kids to be happy, well adjusted and enjoying life.
Kids with ASD respond to using visuals to understand routines, transitions and expectations of them.  In the school environment, ASD kids are likely to find themselves able to make more sense of their world when they use visual timetables and visual cues.
At home, we can take a leaf out of the school book and use similar visuals to help our ASD child thrive in the home environment too.
ASD kids struggle with understanding:

• How they feel
• How others feel
• How to interpret the signals of how others feel

Let’s take a look at how visuals can help us take a massive step towards supporting emotional well being at home.

Supporting Emotional Well Being At Home

1. School Strategies which can help you

• Ask for help from your child’s teacher to find out what visuals are used in the classroom.
• Your child will have a team of professionals to support them at school.  You can discuss with them which visual programs are being used.
• Examples include: Boardmaker pictures, communication boards, visual timetable symbols, social stories.
• It will really help your ASD child if they have consistency with the same visuals being used at home and at school.
• Also check whether the school uses black & white or colour visuals with your child – again consistency is the key.
• If you have any home support for your child, for example, a speech therapist, they will be delighted to set up and show you how to use visuals to their fullest potential.

Using Visuals At Home

Here are some examples of strategies which are available for you to use at home.
1. Emotions thermometer

• An image of a thermometer can be a useful tool to encourage a child to “measure” their emotions.
• A low temperature means your child is happy. As it gets higher, then your child is becoming more anxious and unhappy.

2. Fast, slow, just right visual model, eg, SticKids

• Stickids provides a system of planners and pictures to make a visual timetable for your child.
• The program includes frameworks for supporting emotional well being at home.
• More information is available at SticKids.

5. High, just right, low visual model, eg The Alert Program

• The Alert Program uses this quote: “If your body is like a car engine, sometimes it runs on high, sometimes it runs on low, and sometimes it runs just right!”
• This program focuses on what sort of emotional state your child is in.

6. Zones of regulation program

• Zones of regulation is a framework to support emotional well being.
• There are four zones:
• Red is very upset eg terror, rage, anger
• Yellow is upset eg anxiety, frustration
• Green is calm, where emotional well being is good.
• Blue is low eg sad, sick, tired

7. Just Right Kids Model which combines fast, slow, just right

• The Just Right Kids Technique has been developed through over 17 years of experience.
• It takes the best bits from some of the above examples and combines them.
• Just Right Kids provides a way for you and your child to learn about their emotional well being.

How Can The Just Right Kids Technique Help You & Your Family?

We all want our family life to be happy, relaxed and working well as a team.  It can be a struggle for kids at both school and home to feel like they are OK and coping with the daily demands of life.
In supporting emotional well being at home, we allow our kids to thrive in a world that they would otherwise struggle to understand.
It is important for an ASD kid to have a framework around which they can work out their emotions and deal with them with success.

What Is the Just Right Kids Technique?

Just Right Kids has six areas to understand.   Once children get to grips with these six, you can use the Just Right Kids Technique to practice with them to manage their emotions.  In time, this will help lessen meltdowns and tantrums.

The Six Areas of Just Right Kids

1. When my body is going fast

• Our bodies are going fast when we are excited, happy, have lots of energy.
• This can cause a level of alertness that is too high to sit down (and this may cause us to get into trouble!)
• Our thinking can be unclear and it is difficult to concentrate.

2. When my body is going tired / slow

• We might find it hard to get up in the morning.
• We might be lethargic and going too slow all day.
• We can be under responsive and perceived as being “lazy”.

3. When my body is angry

• I feel stressed out and on high alert.
• I can’t control my body, I am reacting to an event and might feel hard done by.

4. When my body is in meltdown or tantrum mode

• I am in overwhelm and my senses are frazzled.
• I might be in the meltdown zone.
• I might be in the tantrum zone and I’m trying to take back some control.
• This zone could quickly disintegrate into the sad or angry zone.

5. When my body is sad / slow

• I feel sad, curl up or have a cry.
• I might be recovering from a meltdown.
• I might be tired or sad.

6. When I am a ‘just right’ kid

• When I am feeling ‘just right’ I feel safe, happy and emotionally okay.
• I have the right attitude to life.
• I can concentrate, listen and understand what is happening around me.

The goal of the Just Right Kids Technique is that your child is just right for most of the time.
When you are supporting emotional well being at home, remember to find out what visual strategies school are using and use them to help your ASD kid at home too.
Remember also, that it can take time and patience to put successful strategies in place, keep in mind the long-term goal of having all of your family (including you!) in a good place.

Overwhelmed: A Child’s Safe Space

Written by Deb Hopper

Published in

Navigating through the day as a child can be an exhilarating, yet daunting process. There is the fun and joy of play, friends and family. There is also the challenge of meeting new people, the social challenges of interaction with play, the environmental challenge of coping with noise, lights and movement at preschool or school or at the supermarkets. Just as adults, if the challenges outweigh our capacity, children can experience stress and overwhelm.
The signs of overwhelm are exhibited differently between different children but may include:

• needing to take control of situations that may be seen as being bossy or dominant in play
• meltdowns and crying
• ‘behavioural’ issues, whining, clinginess or oppositional behaviour.

These signs or clues that your child may be overwhelmed may be shown more at home, at school or both. Many children can ‘hold it together’ at preschool or school, but once safe at home, they feel safe and their emotions overflow.
Other children find the preschool/school environment overwhelming and their stress cues/signs are more pronounced at school. Either way, it’s important to be a detective and notice the signs of overwhelm and once identified, put a plan of reducing this stress before it escalates.
It is also important to be aware that overwhelm may come from a combination of at least 2 sources. Mental or emotional overwhelm – feeling that the demands of a task are way too difficult, or sensory overwhelm – with factors of the environment being too much to handle. Examples of sensory overwhelm might include too much noise, glare or too much light, not liking the feeling of touch of some objects such as tags in shirts, seams in socks or messy glue.
How to create a safe space when your child is overwhelmed.
When a child shows signs of overwhelm, it’s important to provide a safe place. This might be a physically safe space, or it may be simply verbal acknowledgement that it looks as if things are difficult.
Five top ways to reduce overwhelm for a child may include:
1. Create a physical space in a corner of a room at home or in the classroom such as a small tent. A safe space could include cushions, fidget toys, favourite books, a bean bag half-filled so they can nestle in and feel safe, a heavy blanket, calm music and fairy lights or oil timers or oil toys. This can be called the safe space, or create a fun name for it that your child owns.
2. Have a conversation about the reason why they may feel overwhelmed. Tell them you want to help them, but that you need some clues as to why they feel this way and then tell them you can help think of some ways to make things easier.
3. Use a visual chart such as the Just Right Kids Technique Model (see link below) to help kids map and point out how they are feeling. A visual map helps them to identify how they feel and having them being able to communicate about this, can relieve some stress and worry.
4. Give them verbal permission that if they are feeling sad, overwhelmed, angry or mad that they can come and tell you, or that they can take themselves straight to the safe place.
5. Empower your child or the children you work with to know that having feelings and emotion, including being overwhelmed is normal, but that there are ways that we can help change how we feel, including using a safe space as in point 1 above.
As parents, carers and teachers, we tune in to the needs of the children in our life. However, sometimes we can become a little disconnected or busy and not notice the cues of overwhelm. Creating a sensory safe space is one strategy that can be used to help children cope with overwhelm. Teaching a child to have more independence in knowing their emotions and experimenting with strategies to reduce stress, is a great life skill that will be well used through to adult hood.
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Download this article to print easily here:Deb Hopper Overwhelmed-A-Childs-Safe-Space
Deb Hopper… Occupational Therapist, author, workshop presenter. Deb is passionate about empowering parents and educators to understand the underlying reasons of why children struggle with behaviour, self-esteem and sensory processing difficulties. A practicing Occupational Therapist, she understands the daily struggles that children, parents and teachers face.
Deb is the co-author of the CD Sensory Songs for Tots, and author of Reducing Meltdowns and Improving Concentration: The Just Right Kids Technique. The Just Right Kids Technique Model can be downloaded at: http://www.lifeskills4kids.com.au/just-right-kids-model/
You can contact Deb on 02 6555 9877. She is available for clinic and phone/ Skype consultations.

Here are some ideas for creating a sensory corner at home using easily sourced and low cost products.

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I have this room – it’s not private enough for a fourth bedroom, not secure enough for an office or study, and calling it a ‘play room’ is frankly annoying because all I ever see is toys scattered everywhere. But it’s a space that I can use to help my kids with their sensory processing skills.
Here are some simple ideas that maybe you can use to create a Sensory Corner, too.
We rent our home, so suspending chairs and swings from the ceilings is a no go. I can’t paint the walls with different colours and textures, nor can I rip up the thirty-year-old carpet. But after much procrastination and too much time spent flipping through the week’s ridiculous amount of junk mail, I have found a solution.
Welcome to our Sensory Corner.
I have a seven-year-old boy with ASD (Autism Spectrum Disorder) who loves soft, cuddly things and things that feel weird for me but thrilling for him. Oh, and he loves being upside down. So, when we go shopping, he feels and smells all the items we look at and gives his approval. Or not. We’re on a tight budget, like really tight, and he cannot be in shopping centres all day, so it takes a few days to gather all the items he approves.
This is what I came up with
All these items were easily found in local shops:

• Colourful cushions (Big W)
• Lightweight sheer curtains (Spotlight)
• Three beanbags, all different in size and fabric (Big W, Spotlight) – and don’t forget the beans (Big W, Spotlight)
• A fluffy long-haired mat that reminds me of the Dulux dog (K-Mart)
• Paper party decorations to hang from the ceiling.
And this is what I did with our ‘approved’ purchases
Beanbags: I filled them up, but each one differently. One was full, one was half full, and the third was only partially filled.
Cushions: I just arranged them randomly on a small couch.
Curtains: Ok, so I may have sneakily drilled, fitted and hung these. The see-through chiffon material gives off different colours in different light.
Hanging decorations: We have the old air-con vents in the ceiling, So, I opened up a paper clip, attached the decoration to one end, and hooked it into the vent.

Using Hama beads, we made some simple items such as rainbows, hearts, and faces with different emotions. WE joined them with fishing line and tied them onto the end of the curtain rods.
Now we have what is the start of our Sensory Corner and over time we can add to these. Our latest addition was a little trampoline we found out on the street before council pick up. With a bit of a clean, it now has a place where it can be used inside. I was worried about the legs damaging the carpet, but I found that the lids off the 2 litre milk bottles fit perfectly.
The biggest thing I’ve learnt is that there is no right or wrong way to create a room or a sensory space. It’s all about what suits your family and your child/children.
So get planning… because when all the kids are asleep, there’s nothing wrong with us parents making a cuppa and relaxing in a beanbag.

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Travelling with Children

Written by Deb Hopper

Published in

Great Health Guide articles available in Audio:

CLICK HERE FOR THE AUDIO VERSION:

School holidays are the perfect time to jump in the car and visit family and friends that we haven’t seen for a long time. Often this means a long car and/or plane trip. While many children get excited about the thought of seeing friends and family, the process of getting there often does not feel like a holiday and parents can wonder if it’s really worth the effort.

Here are five top tips for staying sane through long holiday trips and even have some fun along the way:

1. Create a diary, journal or scrap book before you leave for the holidays. Kids love to plan ahead, ask questions about what they will be doing, planning activities and seeing what is available in the area you are heading to.
On the first page, draw up a grid for the days and weeks you will be away, similar to a calendar. If you are going away for 2 weeks, include the week before or after. If you have set plans on specific days, add them in. Add in who you will be staying with on different days.
Kids love to know what’s coming up and this can reduce worry and anxiety.
2. In the diary, journal or scrapbook, allocate at least one page for every day that you will be away. Children can then use these in the car or on the plane and draw different things they see during the trip. This can be a useful ‘project’ or distraction for keeping the peace during long travel stretches. They can also collect brochures, pictures, stickers, leaves, flowers, in fact anything on the way and paste or sticky tape it in. Make sure that you pack some tape or glue stick supplies! Call into your local travel agent or visit an information session on the way and pick up a free brochure for children to read or look at pictures on the way.
3. For really long car trips, visit your bargain shop and stock up on $2 packs of craft supplies e.g. giant pipe cleaners, post it notes, colouring in books, or other cheap novelty toys. Create little paper bags of goodies and give them out slowly over the trip as needed. This guarantees mess in the back seat, but it’s also guaranteed to divert and occupy little minds and little hands.
4. Listen to audio books or podcasts. This is a great use of time. Choose a book that is age appropriate and even if you listen to 15 or 20 minutes at a time, it will help to break the trip.
5. Take a break. We all know that taking a break every 2 hours is imperative for reducing driver fatigue and taking a break will also help keep the kids sane. Stop at a park and give them a big burst of muscle and movement sensory input. Movement and muscle helps to get the wiggles out and will help keep them sane for the next driving leg.
Long family trips can be challenging but we hope that these ideas can make things easier and more fun! For more great tips for helping busy children find it easier cope with daily life, visit my website.
Summer road trips with the family are a classic Australian holiday. But scorching heat, tight spaces and bickering siblings can spell disaster in a matter of seconds. Before you embark on your next long car ride make sure you’ve ticked all these boxes first.

New Year’s Eve starts with a bang and it should. The fireworks fascinates almost everybody. The light, colour and sound adds to their brilliance. It’s definitely intense, complex, unexpected with fast pace movement, and that is why it’s alerting and exciting for us.
But for many children, the fireworks can be scary, overwhelming or even terrifying. This might include children who struggle with sensory processing difficulties.
Here’s our top 5 strategies to prevent it getting too overwhelming for children:

1. Use ear muffs to dampen the noise, reducing its intensity.
2. Give children their sip bottles which they can use to sip in between the show. This strategy generally eases them down. It can also be complemented with some chewable necklaces or food.
3. Get them to hold a squeeze toy or a sponge ball and squeeze it hard as possible when the sound gets overwhelmingly loud.
4. Give them a big hug during the fireworks. Deep touch pressure is calming to the nervous system.
5. Before you leave prepare your child for what is going to happen and what to expect so that they can be prepared and have a plan set out.

TRY THEM OUT. ENJOY THE FIREWORKS.
BANG !!!!