I love toys. Hence, why I am on the Toy Insider Parent Advisory Board. Yet, with my son’s learning disability, at times I need to look at toys from a different angle.
With his disability, he has a hard time attending to a game or understanding play potential with a toy. While most children intuitively begin to role play with toys as they mature, for example, it is something that has to be taught to my son. Playing a game can seem like a long time to him, so we seek out games that are short but can be extended in length to work on his ability to attend. For children on the spectrum, parents may recognize these goals as part of an ABA program.
One game that I discovered recently that supports these efforts is called Treasure Trax, from USAopoly. You can see my full review of it here. While it’s a great game for kids of all ages and abilities, it’s also a great game for children on the spectrum due to its underlying applied behavioral techniques.
Treasure Trax can achieve three functions for children with learning difficulties: attention span, step-by-step directions, and increasing challenges that can be mastered to track progress.
One way is to use Treaure Trax is as a scavenger hunt. You hide a card by the telephone. When your child finds it, the card there shows a table. So your child runs to the table and on the table is a card with a picture of a television, so your child runs to the television…and so on. The educational aspect with Treasure Trax is that you can just start with two cards and increase the directive, and staying on task in light of distractions (seeing a toy car on the way to the table) with more cards. We also provide an incentive by way of a reward at the end of the game to encourage attending. For example, finding an iPad at the end of the allotted cards and being able to play with it for 10 minutes!
Another way to play the game is to make it a matching game. Take some cards with animals and some cards with the letters and colors and see if your child can match the card with the letter “D” to a card with an object that begins with the letter D. Or have your child match a card with the color “Brown” with an object that is the color brown. This educational opportunity can start by just learning the animals and identifying and labeling them, as well as the colors and letters. Progress can be made by matching them. You can even work on the goal of matching three cards: Alligator card, matched to the Green card, matched to the A card.
So if you are looking for a game that is fun for a child with learning disabilities such as ADD or Autism, definitely check out Treasure Trax for fun and learning support!
