Picture schedules: is it just me, or does anyone else

[Pepper]

I The whole point is to help manage transitions, isn't it?

Thank, Uno-Mom and everyone else, for your replies. I should have said, DS1 is wicked hyperactive (several of his teachers and therapists have described him as "off the charts"), impulsive, and who knows what else - we are waiting for a full developmental eval. I don't really think that he's on the autisim spectrum but I suspect that hemight have some sort of personality disorder. He turns 5 in April and his teachers, etc are pushing pretty hard to put him on medication (for the hyperactivity, I think) when he starts kindergarten.

So, I think the point of the picture schedule is to manage transitions but also to get him to complete tasks, alon gwith the idea that he doesn't get to move on to the next task/picture until he's completed the previous one. But, he's pretty defieant these days, so I raninto a lot of problems today...granted it was the first full day of using the schedule, but yikes. I have to figure out a new lexicon of appropriate consequences for his actions. For example, both he & his brother think it's funny to whack the tv so our rule was if you hit the tv, you get one reminder and then if you hit the tv again, the tv gets turned off. But then he won't have completed the tv portion of his schedule...so I've gotta figure that out.

DS1 actually did pretty well with the schedule today. In the mornings before school we'd been doing a pretty detailed schedule anyway, there's not that much time between when he gets up & when he has to leave for school so there's not a lot of looseness anyway. The really challenging part of theday is ~4pm when I want to start getting ready to make dinner and I really just want the boys to go play so I can cook. that's when they both start acting up - messing with the computer, the tv, anything that they know that they're not supposed to touch (DS2 is almost 2 and i don't think he's hyperactive, but he does everything tath DS1 does). Anyway, we've locked up almost everything already but a few things are still out and accessible, and there are some things that simpely can't be made inaccessible.
SO things just kind of fell apart at that time and I tried pulling out the schedule, pointing to the upcoming task which was something DS1 wanted to do and saying If you do X again, I will take this off the schedule. And DS1 did whatever it was, of course, so off the schedule it came.

Sigh...sorry to go on for so long! I'm sure part of it is just that DS1 is not used to a picture schedule at home. His preschool teacher used one last year, and by the end of the year she said that he really didn't need it anymore. So hopefully all this acting up today was just b/c he'snot used to the schedule at home thing.

Thanks again to everyone for all of their input!!

[Uno-Mom]

Ah ... testing, testing. Isn't normal kid behavior wonderful?

I hope it turns into a nice tool for your son.

That post-it comment gave me flashbacks to the day I tried and tried again to draw a picture of a lava lamp for somebody's board. Sigh, don't ASK about my artistic abilities. The guy looked at me and said (in perfect non-verbals, mind you): "and they say I'm the one with the problem ... what the heck is that picture supposed to be???"

Hope your drawing abilities are superior to mine.

[snowbunnies300]

I just can't do picture schedules. I can't wrap my head around it. To me there are just too many variables. I understand that at school there are things that they do everyday at the same time and can see how a picture schedule at school works. Here at home...I fall to the wayside. I'd also need to have three schedules. One for each of the boys.

I grew up in a conservative household but a free spirited one as well. Sounds like a strange combo but it's what I had. Dinner some nights were at 5 PM. The next night 9 o'clock. My mom didn't like the clock to tell her when to do things. I got up in the morning and ate when I wanted. Played with what I wanted and for how long. There was no schedule. I don't function well on schedules. I find a schedule to be confining and can't stand it at all.

It's funny because I don't think my kids are on much of a schedule but my family would say the opposite! My sister is the first to remind me that I have them on a pretty tight schedule. I tell her it's nothing compared to what school would like me to do!

[elliput]

That post-it comment gave me flashbacks to the day I tried and tried again to draw a picture of a lava lamp for somebody's board. Sigh, don't ASK about my artistic abilities. The guy looked at me and said (in perfect non-verbals, mind you): "and they say I'm the one with the problem ... what the heck is that picture supposed to be???"

Hope your drawing abilities are superior to mine.

One of DD's therapists recommended looking for clip art or taking a photo of any unique items.

[Gena]

We use schedules at home, but becuase of DS's early reading ability I use words instead of pictures, or sometimes words with pictures. This is nice because my drawing abilities are terrible. For the stuff I need pictures off, I usually take photos or use goggle images.

DS likes schedules that act as checklists. So we do a lot of these. I either have lots of plain paper copies of the same schedule so DS can check items off (good for carrying around) or I laminate a master schedule and let DS checkit off with a dry-erase marker.

For changes in the schedule, I put a red universal no (circle with slash) over the item(s) we will be skipping and I try to leave enough space between items that I can squeeze an extra one in.

Some of our schedules are very detailed and other are not. We have a general schedule for the week that is not very detailed. I use detailed schedules (checklists) for things like running errands, so DS can know where we are going (in what order) . This keeps him from telling me every 5 minutes that he wants to go home.

At this point, we are working with DS to learn to set up and manage the schedule/to do list himself. He also is starting to manage his own calendar (on the iPad). I think these are good skills that will serve him well in the future.