How to Teach a Student with Autism to Imitate Your Actions

Imitation is an important skill to develop between the ages of 1 and 4 years of age.

Imitation is an important part of early-childhood development, as it promotes learning and the development of social behaviors. Children with autism tend to show impaired ability to imitate skills and actions in certain contexts, which vary depending on the child. Teaching an autistic child to imitate actions requires patience and technique.

Difficulty:

Easy

Instructions

1. Engage in free play with the child and imitate his actions, rather than prompting him to imitate yours. Allow the child to choose toys so that he is interested and engaged in the activity. Rotate toys every half hour, if necessary, to keep his interest.

2. Narrate the child's activities and mimic his actions with duplicate toys, gestures and vocalizations. Comment aloud on your actions to call his attention to the fact that he being imitated and to reinforce language and vocabulary for the particular action. For instance, if the child is rolling a toy truck on the floor, do the same within his scope of vision and narrate, "The truck is rolling."

3. Model an action with a duplicate of the toy with which the child is playing. For instance, if the child is rolling a ball, drop or bounce a duplicate ball. Narrate your activity so that it is noticed. Present the action three times, giving the child an opportunity to imitate the action. If she imitates you, give praise. If she does not imitate you, physically lead her through the action and then give her praise. Advance to modeling actions with toys that the child is not already manipulating, once the child shows progress with imitating your actions.

4. Use gesture imitation to teach actions in context. Model actions related to the child's play. For instance, if the child is playing with a toy truck, model an action that relates to driving, such as steering a wheel or opening a car door. Model gestures that are meaningful to the context to encourage imitation.

References

• Michigan State University; Teaching Imitation to Children with Autism: A Focus on Social Reciprocity; Brooke Ingersoll; 2007
• Children's Disabilities Information: Helping Children with Autism Learn
• Eindhoven University of Technology: Engaging Autistic Children in Imitation and Turn-Taking Games with Multiagent System of Interactive Lighting Blocks; Jeroen C. J. Brok and Emilia I. Barakova

Resources

• Lovass Institute: Our Difference