Motivators for Kids with Autism and ADHD

     If you have a child or student with autism or ADHD, you know how difficult it can be to get them to complete school work.  Many times they are only interested in their current mania.  Don't fight it.  Use it!

    1.  I have my kids choose a reward from the Reward Board.  They place it next to their work so they can remember what they are working for.  Then we set the timer for a reasonable amount of time, and if they finish in that amount of time, they get their reward.  For some kids, this is enough to move them through their work.  My older kids will to two "Need-to-Do's" before they get to do a "Want-to-Do" from the board.  It's a great way of teaching time management.

     2.  My son with autism has serious attention issues and has to be moved from one problem to the next.  Even in his classroom of kids on the spectrum, he monopolized the aide. We just started homeschooling him this year, so I developed ways to motivate him problem-by-problem or line-by-line.

     Since he loves Angry Birds Transformers, I printed out pictures of various characters, cut them out, and laminated them.  As he finishes a problem or row, depending on his ability to focus that day, he grabs a piece of the Transformer from a plastic bag and "builds" it as he does his work.  When the page is done, the Transformer is complete AND he has earned his chosen reward from the Reward Board.  This idea is simple because no matter how his interests change, I can always make new characters to motivate him.  He also gets a kick out of mixing and matching Transformer parts.

     3.  Too keep things fresh, we also use sticker puzzles in the same way.

     4.  If you don't have any stickers on hand or just want to mix things up, you can draw a part of a picture each time a row is completed.

          5.  Both my son and daughter on the spectrum also love a "secret message"on their work. As they finish a problem, I write one of the letters of the message down in random order.

     The great thing about each of these motivators is that they can be adapted easily for the student's attention that day or to their ability to concentrate as it improves over time.  They also make use of the power of the student's mania.  Yes, it is a lot of work to motivate our students with attention issues, but it is much more satisfying and effective to draw a picture or build a mini puzzle than it is to say for the thousandth time, "Come on, next problem!"