A video and toy discovery

[Guest guest]

Hello everyone!

I just wanted to share a discovery we made yesterday. I purchased a toy for

a friend's son and our son was completely enamored with it. The toy is the

Little People Zoo and Animals Bundle. I bought it at Costco for just under

$20 and it came with a free Little People video. What made this toy so

great is that our son, Evan (6yo, ASD), wanted DESPERATELY (but not

frantically) to open it up. He didn't even know that the video was inside.

He is not completely aversive to playing with pretend play toys, but he

would much prefer building/visual performance toys over pretend play. He

dropped everything to open this box. After we had played with the zoo for a

while, I thought it okay to show the video. The first part of the video

worried me a little because the animals on the farm were pretending to be

each other (the cow was making sheep noises, etc...) but it quickly shifted

to helping the animals to find their voices. There were four segments of

the video which runs 25 minutes. The video incorporated all of the Little

People that we happen to have from various toys (Little People Farm, School

Bus, Garage, and now...Zoo). After the video ended, our three boys went

around the house collecting all of the various pieces of the toys and

putting them together as a sort of city. Evan gathered up some of the toys

we have had for years (that he has never shown an interest in) and began

walking them through what looked to me like skits. When he woke up today,

that is the first thing that he wanted to do. He drove the zookeeper around

with the fish and placed the fence around the zoo. He found the garage,

farm, tractor and walked the animals to their feeding areas and put the

animals in their appropriate cages. The animals inside the zoo make their

appropriate sounds when you depress their buttons inside their " exhibits. "

What made this extraordinary for me was that these toys have been

specifically targeted over the past few months with little success. He

would go through the motions, but wasn't excited about it. I had placed

those toys " on hold " recently until I figured out a better approach.

Apparently, there are several videos available, including a Christmas video,

and they have a few more toys that the boys don't have (Zoo train, Fire

truck, Airport, and Garbage truck). What a great opportunity to talk about

the community, prepositions, tacts, and intraverbals! We are so excited! I

sincerely hope it is as effective for you if you decide to give it a try.

Good luck to all of you in your programs!

Now I just have to run back to the store to buy another Little People Zoo

and Animals Bundle for our friend's son! :-)

Best regards,

Tamara