Alternative Reality: Fitness and Your Child

In years past, when in workshops or conventions, I would be informed that I would be grouped in the “Alternative Treatment” section. I’m not quite sure what fitness and play are alternative to. Perhaps sitting on the couch in front of a TV or endless hours at a computer are the answers. The consensus seems to suggest that these are certainly not the most beneficial activities, or in- activities, for young populations, particularly those on the autism spectrum. Fitness and healthy living are the cornerstones of optimal development. They should be the central curriculum components in classroom and home environments.  Often, for successful fitness programs with the ASD population, we need to incorporate some alternative strategies.

Whether on 1-to-1, or in group situations, fitness activities often require some modification to become fun, appealing, and appropriate for young people with autism. Right now we are in our second round of the Get FRESH Fitness and Healthy Living program, the first research project of its kind. Interestingly, several athletes in our first group of adolescents were shy and withdrawn about performing animal based movements as a warm-up.  They reported back that it made them feel uncomfortable and the bear walks, frog jumps, and gorilla hops were too “babyish” for them. I modified the activities, and had them perform similar movement variations (jumping, rotation, squatting) that did NOT have animal names.

Last week our second and third groups began the program. I was careful with our high functioning group (the previous group was mid-range functioning) not to label the animal-based movements as animal movements. It didn’t matter what I called them. Our second group LOVES the animal-based activities and thinks, according to their parents, that they are the funniest, most enjoyable physical activity ever. If I pretended to have all the answers I would be in a lot of trouble.  Still, there are a few things about fitness and autism that I have a decent enough grasp of. Rule # 1, for example.

Autism Fitness Rule # 1 is: You can’t force fun.  There is a difference between a teaching process and a complete free play environment. I may be teaching a new activity which, considering many of my athlete’s with autism, is not the most fun thing in the world. Teaching a medicine ball woodchopper requires the following steps (in order):

-       Stand with feet wide

-       Pick up med ball or Sandbell

-       Raise overhead

-       Bend knees and touch ball/bell to floor

-       Raise overhead

Depending on the individual, teaching this activity can take five minutes or five months to master. For many children and young people on the spectrum, that learning process may not be the most funnest-everest time. Pairing or associating the woodchoppers with preferred activities or known reinforcers (stuff we already know the athlete likes) will make the teaching process much easier and more fun. Just because you are telling a child that they “are having fun” or “This is fun!” does not mean that enjoyment will be automatic.

In the home setting, fitness activities can be used to bring a family together, laugh, and alleviate stress. I’ve worked with plenty of parents who are nervous to begin an exercise program with their child or children because they have not been active in some time (or ever). I am familiar with the combination of nervous laughter and darting eyes when I ask parents to perform a squat or press a ball overhead. The truth is that physical activity is a vitally important part of life and health for everyone, and has also become too confusing, too overwhelming, and out of the norm for most people.

Try this. Forget every image you have of treadmills and machines and crowded gyms and airbrushed magazine pictures demonstrating yoga poses in far off places. Think of hopping, and throwing, and climbing and bending. Think of the movements you have to do each day, from getting out of a car to reaching in a high cabinet for a box. Consider how being fit and healthy can improve the life of each member in your family, and then how you can begin a program at home. Not an hour-long immediately, but a few minutes every day. Break activities down into small steps so that children (and young adults) can master each step. Figure out how many different ways you can hop, throw a medicine ball, pick up a Sandbell, or swing a big rope.

In five years or maybe a decade, special needs education programs may begin to incorporate physical education programs that make sense. (Believe me, most of them don’t right now) As a society, we have finally accepted that exercise and healthy living are important and can greatly affect how well we function in other areas of life. If fitness programs do not catch up to the needs of the young community in the next ten years, that will mean an entire generation of young people missed out. Perhaps I have a bias, being that I am the Autism Fitness Guy, but I highly recommend that we begin to develop great fitness programs now, not later, in the classroom and in the home.

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