The Clubhouse is the Behavioral Intervention Association's (http://www.bia4autism.org) after-school program. Once a week, children between the ages of 5 and 12, who have communication and social challenges, meet and engage in fun activities to practice different social skills. The Explorers focus on skills such as staying with the group, greetings, turn taking, participating independently in activities, and brief exchanges with peers. The Adventurers focus on skills such as initiating and maintaining conversations, perspective taking, and negotiating with peers.
The Adventurers: Magnets (From Magnets to Magic Mixtures)
Small Group Project “Magnet Painting”: We
worked in teams and created paintings using magnets,
paint and paper:
- Place and tape a sheet of plexiglas (approximately 11x14) on two large wooden blocks so that there is enough room under the plexi to move hands.
- Tape a piece of paper onto the plexi.
- Place blobs of paint (different colors work best) on the paper.
- Place magnet balls (1 for each child) on the plexi.
- Move another magnet (1 for each child) against the underside of the plexi.
Magnet painting is not only a fun activity that lets everyone experience magnetism but is also a great project to promote teamwork and cooperative play. Here are some ideas:
- Students follow or chase each other, e.g., one student takes the lead by moving the magnet ball in one direction and the partner tries to follow.
- Students negotiate what patterns they want to create.
- Students let their magnets attract and paint as a team.
What attracts? We were split up into small groups. We experimented with different materials and determined what objects attract to magnets. One of us drew an item out of the
bag and first we discussed as a group if we thought the item was magnetic or not. Then, we placed the object
into a tray and used a magnet to see if the
object stuck to the magnet. We placed the items that were magnetic on a green piece
of paper and the non-magnetic on a red paper. Some objects were easy to determine such as items made out of wood, others were more tricky (e.g., a CD or stainless steel spoon).
No comments:
Post a Comment