Organization Station-- Waiting and Taking Turns

Students with autism and other social communication disabilities often struggle with waiting and taking turns during activities and games. These students often need these skills directly taught because they struggle to pick them up in the context of these social activities. Today's Organization Station focuses on strategies for teaching waiting and turn taking skills to help these students be more successful.

When directly teaching social skills, Carol emphasizes using the 4 Pillars of Performance--Practice, Prim, Prompt, and Praise.

Practice
To start, practice waiting and turn taking in a structured, predictable setting to reduce frustration. For some students, you may need to start with 1:1 sessions and gradually add additional practice partners to start generalizing these skills. Once the student shows success in a structured setting, begin practicing in naturally occurring locations. Sometimes, these skills can be addressed through class-wide structural supports that make turn taking more predictable.

We love this visual for remembering whose turn it is in a preschool classroom. The push pin moves daily to determine who the helper will be.

Jessica Burns
Demmitt Elementary, Vandalia

For some activities, everyone may get a turn but visual supports are needed to determine the order. A fun way is the use of turn taking sticks. All of the sticks can be mixed up in a container and the teacher can build anticipation and engagement through shaking up the container and choosing a stick. When their turn is over, students can choose the next student to go which is a great way to work on identifying peer names.

Prime
When staff anticipates the student will need to wait or take turns, they should prime the student to prepare them. Remind them of the strategies that have been practiced and present any priming visual supports that have been directly taught.

Carol developed a "WAIT" card that can be used to prime students when waiting in line, when waiting for their turn to speak, or when waiting for their turn during an activity. The back of the card lists strategies that have been directly taught to the student to help them cope with waiting. This can be presented to the student beforehand to prime them. The front of the card can be used to prompt the student in the moment to remind them to use their strategies.

Prompt
Visual supports can also be used to subtly prompt students in the moment.

This great visual tool can be held by students while they are waiting to keep their hands busy and prevent them from grabbing materials or game pieces.

Taylor Ruef
Stevenson Elementary, Mad River Local Schools

The staff in Christine Scarborough's class at Tecumseh Elementary use these simple visuals to cue students when playing games. The yellow paper says "wait" and prompts students to stay seated while the green paper says "go" to let the student know when it is their turn.

Christine Scarborough
Tecumseh Elementary, Xenia

Praise
Once a skill has been directly taught, students should be praised and reinforced for using the skill during practice sessions and within the naturally occurring locations.