Sensory Seeking

Spinning and swinging are often observed behaviours in autistic children. While these actions might seem repetitive or unusual to some, they serve crucial functions for these children. Understanding the underlying reasons for spinning and swinging can provide valuable insights into how to support autistic children and incorporate these activities into therapeutic settings.

Why do children spin?

Spinning is a common sensory-seeking activity in autistic children. Sensory seeking means that the child actively looks for sensory input to regulate their nervous system. Here’s why spinning can be beneficial:

• Vestibular input: Spinning stimulates the vestibular system, which is located in the inner ear and is responsible for balance and spatial orientation. For children with sensory processing difficulties, spinning can provide essential sensory input.
• Calming effect: For some children, spinning can be a self-regulating strategy. The rhythmic motion can help to calm the nervous system and reduce anxiety.
• Sensory exploration: Spinning allows children to explore their sensory experiences. It can help them understand their bodies and how they move in space.

The allure of swinging

The rhythmic back-and-forth motion of a swing offers several benefits:

• Vestibular input: Like spinning, swinging stimulates the vestibular system, helping to improve balance and coordination.
• Proprioceptive input: Swinging provides proprioceptive input, which is the sense of where your body is in space. This information is crucial for motor planning and coordination.
• Calming and organising: The rhythmic motion of swinging can have a calming effect on the nervous system, helping to regulate emotions and improve focus.
• Social interaction: Swinging can be a shared experience, fostering social interaction and communication.
• Facilitating communication: While swinging, children are so much more relaxed and open to communication. The rhythmic motion can also help facilitate singing, humming, listening to my singing, non-verbal communication for sure but also more verbal and mouth words can be heard from children on my swing. If nothing else, it is so fun and helps build trust and rapport between my child and me.

Therapeutic Activities Combining Spinning, Swinging, and Speech and Language Therapy

Here are some therapeutic techniques that I use at London Speech and Feeding to combine movement with speech and language development:

• Swinging with verbal prompts: While the child is swinging, I provide simple verbal prompts such as ‘up’, ‘down’, ‘fast’, and ‘slow.’ This helps to develop receptive language skills and improve auditory processing.
• Sensory-motor play: I like to combine swinging with tactile activities like playing with textured balls or bean bags. This can facilitate language development through descriptive language, words and scripts like: ‘that’s so soft’, ‘oooh tickle tickle tickle!’
• Storytelling on the swing: Often I manage to create a story while the child is swinging. This can improve narrative skills, vocabulary, and imagination. Recently I did the ‘Tiger who came to tea’ story and each time the swing stopped the tiger came and ‘ate some more cakes’ and ‘tickled their tummy’ whilst eating. It may make not much sense but my child loved it and we had ‘more tiger eat more’.
• Song and rhyme time: Often I sing the ‘rumble in the jungle’ song while swinging my child to enhance phonological awareness, rhythm, and timing.
• Visual supports always help: I use LAMP Words for Life AAC support during swinging and show core words such as: ‘go’ / ‘stop’/ ‘more’ / ‘tickle tickle’ etc. #lampwordsforlife #aac
• Movement-based activities: We can incorporate activities that require sequencing, such as imitating animal movements or following simple commands while swinging. This can improve motor planning and language comprehension.

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Sonja McGeachie

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