Tips, Ideas & Stories

For the early development of play and learning, even well-intentioned praise is counterproductive and leads to a dependency on being praised. But why is it so important not to praise or verbally encourage a child when they are engrossed in early play...

Many parents worry about what their children eat or don't eat and how best to deal with picky eating behavior. Here are 14 tips for clear rules and routines to keep mealtimes harmonious and avoid food conflicts.

Summary (by Ryan B. Collis) of the history of the diagnosis and intervention industry that has emerged since autism emerged as an ontological category in 1943: Alicia Broderick's (2022) book 'The Autism Industrial Complex: How Branding,...

The biggest obstacle to cognitive development and learning are the avoidance and defense strategies that a child has developed to protect itself from excessive demands. Being aware of this as a companion opens up completely new paths to understanding and...

Throwing objects, from drinking bottles and toys to food, dishes or even feces, can pose great challenges for caregivers and therapists of „early“ children. Because the child often laughs boisterously and finds it so funny...

What distinguishes a Floortime approach from other approaches? As in other approaches, the Floortimer begins by observing the child and assessing their individual sensorimotor profile. The focus is primarily on the child's...

Movement games 'like animals walk' are sensory-motor activities that are not only a lot of fun, but also have a great therapeutic effect for the integration of remaining reflexes and as training for coordination, strengthening body awareness and...

Since the early descriptions by Kanner and Asperger, the diagnosis of autism has evolved from a narrowly defined disorder to a broad spectrum. The revision of the diagnostic criteria for autism spectrum disorders (ASD) in the DSM-5 has...

When we think of language and learning, we usually imagine a speaking child and the brain as the center of development. But this view falls short. In fact, the origin of human intelligence does not lie in isolation in the head, but begins with the...

Building towers out of building blocks is an activity that is often welcomed and considered advanced by adults. But unfortunately, it is often a developmental dead end, especially for children with autistic-like behaviors. Because children (and...

What can you do if a child simply cannot be reached via interactive play like in Floortime? If they don't even notice it? If they do nothing and don't want to do anything? If they just run back and forth, sit on the floor, lie around, or play endlessly with something?.

A healthy diet is fundamental for development and learning. But many children are picky eaters or have difficulties with food. To help them, it is important to know: What is the role of the parent/carer? What should you do and what should you...

When children frequently walk on tiptoe, it is not simply a motor skill, but a profound physical reaction to internal stress that can quickly become established and become a habit that is difficult to overcome....

The key question for creative floor time play is: What else can you do with it? It could be an object, or a movement, or even just a look. Rather than focusing on teaching the child 'how to do it right' and sticking with functional floor play, the...

What we can learn from the still-face experiment for DIRFloortime When we work with children - whether as parents, therapists or educators - we often strive for harmony, sensitivity and smooth interaction. But how the...

  What do children in daycare centers and kindergartens need from caregivers if they don't want to participate, don't want to join in, don't want to be shown anything? aren't interested in the available play materials or processes? can only rely on a limited repertoire of...

What exactly is Floortime? Floortime is not just another method or short training course that you can use from time to time - it is a HOLDING with a holistic view of humanity. DIRFloortime describes a...

Water is this unique medium that envelops you and seems to offer no resistance, that can carry you but cannot be held. To hold it, you need a container that gives the water a shape and a boundary, and then a second...

Learning begins with DOING. And doing requires our hands in particular. Young children are usually constantly busy reaching for things, wanting to „have“ them and take them in their hands. And this is of crucial importance, because in this way...

A child must have developed the following 10 fundamental play activities and rudimentary movement patterns well enough to be able to play and learn, as all further learning builds on these skills: 1. picking up and putting away: Picking up objects with the...

More and more children have learning difficulties, leading to an autism diagnosis more and more frequently these days. They often have few activities to engage in, leading to a vicious cycle of fewer and fewer new and closer experiences. This...

Matching is first about understanding that two objects form a PAIR because they are more similar than different, even if they are not exactly identical. Early matching begins with learning to match two identical objects that are...

The Waldon learning facilitator (parent and practitioner) in the non-interactive learning lesson is aware that: The child learns primarily through his or her own movements in the available* physical space (*sometimes physical limitations restrict the child's...

How can we help a hard-to-reach child who finds nothing interesting and does and wants to do nothing but run back and forth, bounce, lie around, shake things, throw things, scream, or bite? This is where I often resort to the Waldon Method....

The Waldon Method is an educational approach by English neurologist Dr. Geoffrey Waldon, based on direct observations of typical human development and the essential mechanisms of learning in the early months and years. While the ideas...

The Waldon Practitioner As a Waldon practitioner and learning facilitator, you are aware that the child learns primarily through his or her own movements. Why? Movements activate the sensory receptors in the muscles, joints and tendons and send nerve impulses to the...

Healthy development is the result of rich and varied interactions between the child and his environment, both with people and with the things around him. Although every child comes with certain character traits, temperaments, sensory and...

This classic children's play material is so easy to make at home that you will never want to buy it again! It's best to start simply with your hands and imagination (without store-bought tools and cookie cutters) for maximum sensory experience and...

It's winter or autumn and it's osselich outside. You've spent the whole day indoors. Or you've been outside, but your child is still full of energy, running around aimlessly or bouncing loudly on the sofa. You've run out of ideas. It's...

Understanding Language Understanding language begins with the child feeling that he is an effective communicator and repeatedly experiencing that he has loving people around him who understand what he means when he uses his body to...

Mouth and face games, which are really a larger-than-life version of face-to-face games for babies, are probably the most important "games" to get an autistic child talking and interested in human interaction....

10 Developmental Strategies to Help Your Child Understand Language Look at what the child is looking at AND look at his face so you can tune into his emotional state. Remember that the meaning of the words is not in the thing,...

Human language is not only a learned behavior, but consists of complex social communication about emotional-mental states, thoughts and ideas using symbols and cultural meanings. 1. divided attention When a...

Joint Attention Joint attention is the process of sharing the experience of observing an object or event by following the gaze or pointing gestures of another. It is the mental progression from a two-way to a...

Gestural communication Long before a child learns to speak, i.e. at least in the first 15 months, he communicates through GESTURES: with his hands, fingers, pointing, giving, handing, pushing away, ...BODY LANGUAGE: he moves his foot to say "do it again",...

Self-regulation arises from co-regulation The ability to self-regulate is fundamental to healthy development and the basis for all further learning and cooperative behavior. This is a matter of identifying and adapting to challenging behaviors and...

Joint problem solving: Every interaction - a good interaction! When we want to help a child up the developmental ladder, problems are our best friends and helpers! Earlier, after putting Bruno's beloved letters in a screw-top jar, we...

Water is this unique medium that envelops you and seems to offer no resistance, can carry you but cannot be held. To hold it requires a container that gives the water a shape and boundary, and then a second...

Young children with autistic-like behaviors or suspected diagnosis of autism are currently in the whole world, a "burning" issue, because in recent years, the numbers of such children are increasing rapidly in an alarming way. Also educational and...