This is the first post talking about the teaching methods I use which have been successful in my classroom. It will be a brief overview of the approach, where it comes from and how it has been helpful in my own classroom.
Attention Autism
Attention Autism is an approach developed by Gina Davies (please follow this link to her website for more information and for a list of courses available http://ginadavies.co.uk/parents-services/professional-shop/ ).
It is a structured approach to supporting children with their attention, listening, focus and communication skills which I have found to be very successful.
I will start with a brief description of the approach and the first two stages of it. There are four stages to Attention Autism. Thus far, I have only used stages one and two in my own classroom under the direction of the Speech Therapist and another member of staff who have been on one of the courses Gina Davies provides. I am hoping that I will be able to go on one of her courses myself in the new future as I have already found introducing stage one and two with direction from others has had a large impact on the attentions skills of the children I work with.
Stage 1: The adult running the stage sits on a chair or on the floor and the children and adults watching sit around the edge in a semi circle. The adult running the group has a bucket with a lid on and a mini-whiteboard and pen to write with. The adult starts by drawing a picture of a bucket and saying 'time - for bucket.' They might then sing a rhyme to encourage children to come over and sit in the semi circle to see what is inside the bucket.
The adult then removes the lid and looks inside. They use exaggerated expressions and sounds such as a surprised face and a loud 'ooo' exclamation while they pull out one of the objects inside the bucket. The objects inside the bucket should be sufficiently interesting for children to be curious about what will be revealed. The adults sat with the children should model being interested and also expressing their surprise and curiousity. The adults should use some simple language while doing this such as exclaiming 'wow' when something is revealed. 
The objects inside the bucket might be something like a wind up toy or a bouncy ball that flashes when bounced. When pulling out the object the adult and the adults watching will make exaggerated expressions and sounds and then when the object is being used the adults will model simple language to describe what they are doing or seeing. So for instance they might say 'wind, wind' while the adult is winding up the toy. Or 'bounce it, bounce it' while the adult is bouncing the bouncey ball. The adult goes through the items in the bucket until they have all been demonstrated. I usually have about four items in my bucket. Then they place them back into the bucket and put the lid on. During stage 1 the children do not touch the items inside the bucket as the focus is on supporting them to increase their attention skills when someone else is showing them something. Lastly, they pick up the mini-whiteboard and draw a cross over the bucket and say 'bucket is finished.'While doing this, it is important that the adults around are focusing on modelling paying attention and demonstrating language to communicate their thoughts. They should not be focusing on speaking to the children and should ensure that their body language does not communicate a lack of interest in the activity.
Stage 2: When moving on to stage 2 the adult continues to do stage one first. The difference is that they will split their whiteboard into two with a line down the middle first. One the left side they will draw the bucket and complete stage 1 as usual. Once they cross out the bucket and say the bucket is finished, they will then draw something on the right hand side that shows something they are going to do or use for example a bottle of glitter and then say 'time for glitter' or 'time for...' and whatever they have drawn. Stage 2 is an extension of the attention and listening skills of stage 1 and so the adult doesn't demonstrate some toys or objects like in stage one but completes a longer sequence of actions that the children and other adults will watch. For example, they might pour glitter onto a tray and then write in it. Or they might squirt paint into a tray and then push cars through the paint. My favourite so far has been setting up a line of giant dominoes standing on their edge and then pushing them over. The idea of the stage two activities is to develop the feeling of anticipation and then to extend the language used by the children. It can be used to develop language in particular areas. For example, in one stage 2 activity I have done we used an egg box near Easter time and 6 boiled eggs. I then squirted squirty cream into the egg box holes one at a time while counting out loud and encouraging the children and adults to join in with the counting. I then lifted each egg up and splatted it quickly into the cream filled gap of the egg box while counting again. This really supported the children in their development of number understanding. No eggs were wasted either because they were hard boiled so could simply be rinsed, peeled and chopped up for snacks to be eaten later! Stage 2 ends in the same way as stage one, with the adult drawing a cross through their picture and then saying 'glitter is finished' or 'dominoes are finished' or whatever you have chosen to do... 'is finished.'
The impact
So how useful has this method been? From what I have seen this has had a big impact on the concentration skills and the language skills of the children I have been teaching. Children who previously would only come over to a group activity with a lot of adult prompting and encouragement now look up as soon as they see the bucket and whiteboard coming out of the cupboard. They are now joining in adult let activities much more than before and much more happily.
I have also seen an increase in communication skills. Some of the children have developed more expressive facial expressions to show their likes and dislikes more clearly. Some have started saying new words that have been modelled during the Attention Autism sessions. And some have developed anticipation and concentration skills as a result of the sessions.
Overall, I would thoroughly recommend the approach and hope to develop it more in my own classroom going forwards and perhaps begin looking at Stage 3 in the near future.
Please do take a look at Gina Davies website for further information and Gina Davies also has a facebook group on which she often posts ideas of activities for the different stages.
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