Making the Most of Therapy Sessions at Home: Part 1 - The Environment

Today during my afternoon session with a boy I've worked with for over a year, I thought about the number of distractions we encountered. During our one hour of work, the windows were open, filling the room with the sounds of traffic and passersby. The boy's younger sister, who just learned how to walk, kept coming into the living room to see what we were doing. And sometime over the weekend, the boy had placed stickers all over the table we work at. Today, it seemed all he wanted to do was peel the stickers off the table. Near the end of our session, his father's cell phone started to vibrate on the kitchen counter: too loud not to be a distraction, but too quiet for his father to hear it in the bedroom.


The number of distractions in this example is the norm in all of the homes I work in. While I have become accustomed to working around them, I have to wonder how much it impacts the work I do with my students. How are these students, (who are already experiencing delays,) taking in new information and learning at their best with all of these additional obstacles?

As a parent, creating a routine for yourself and your child in preparation for sessions will help make each session more productive:

• Have reinforcers available. Many therapists may bring their own toys and edibles to help motivate your child, but some therapists may request that you have a variety of foods, toys, or videos accessible. Having these prepared ahead of time helps get the session started faster and prevents interruptions during the session.

• Close the windows. Many children with ASD and similar disabilities have difficulty listening to the appropriate sounds. With windows open, the therapist's voice is likely competing with the sounds of traffic, passersby, birds, wind, or rain. Shutting these noises out helps your child recognize what he/she should be listening to.

• Put your phone on silent. Almost every child I work with will interrupt his task to ask "What is that" whenever a phone rings. Keeping your phone on silent or turning off the ringer on landlines helps prevent additional distraction. If possible, schedule phone calls around the session, as children are also frequently distracted by conversations taking place in other rooms.

• Keep a clean space. Some part of your home should be easily turned into a workspace for your child's sessions. It should be uncluttered, free of distracting artwork or decorations, and organized with items they may need for the session. Children of all ability levels struggle with visual distraction, not just auditory distraction.

• Keep it quiet. Indoor noise can be just as distracting as outdoor noise. TVs and music in other rooms should be kept off, and activities should be planned to keep your child's siblings occupied so they do not interrupt sessions. 

These are just a few tips that can make a huge difference.Your ultimate goal is to maximize your child's ability to attend to each session, by providing the optimum learning environment - an environment with a minimum of distraction.