A real fun game for Children who need to spin around.

[Guest guest]

Having a child with autism I had to find creative ways to play with my son. This is good for a floor-time activity.

I get alot of good eye contact and smiles with this game. It is a bonding game between us as well. This game provides vistibular sensory integration along with imagination and creativity.

Here is our special game.

"Wish Wash" Pretend washing machine and dryer. by n. )

My son gets into our swival rocking chair...(any swival chair may do.) Then I pretend as though I am the washing machine mechanism and I lower my right arm and make a slot in my hand for him to pretend he is putting money into..I also make the sounds that go with such a mechanism.

Then after he puts the pretend money in my arm goes back up and then I pretend water is pouring down on him..I start at the top of his head and whigle my fingers on him as though water is rushing down him all the way down to his feet while making a spppppiiiiiissssssshhhh noise. He loves that part. Then I pretend to add the laundry liquid soap and slowly whigle my fingers all the way down to his feet. He giggles when I do that part.

Then I start to wish wash the chair rotating as though he is a agitating and I say "wish wash, wish wash, wish wash, etc. Then I'll turn the chair back facing me around then I slowly peak around the chair and say "peak a boo" After a few times I trick him and make him think I'm going to peak on the right and then I peak on the left side...He loves the anticipation and surprise. I do that about 3 or 4 times and then turn him back to face me and wish wash again..I do that a few times before the spin. Then I say "ready for the spin?" And he will make the noise that I make when I spin him to say yes. Then I spin him around for a minute and then reverse the spin the other way and reverse again while making a shew, shew, shew, shew, sound.

Once the spin cycle is done I say "Here comes the Rinse" and I repeat the water action as I did the first time and then I add pretend fabric softener and this is the same action as the laundry liquid soap. Then I repeat the same action as the first part with the wish wash, peak a boo and then Final spin.

After the wish wash I do a drying cycle where i spin him around and each time as he comes around facing me I blow on him..LOL... He gets a real kick out of that.

I actually just started out with basically just wish washing and then added the laundry soap and fabric softner and the drying part over time. It just evolved into the whole thing.

The whole thing is that it has to work for you and your child...Add your own creative thoughts to the game and it will work out for you. If your child has strict rules about how they want things - make the game according to your childs needs. Keep everything the same for the first few times then try variating one thing at at time. The great thing about this is that my son loves to spin and that is how this game began by the need to spin around at first just spinning him and then doing the wish wash part was a good beginning..I added the extras over time.

Hope you will find this an enjoyable game with your child.

Yours,

n