Autism Soccer: Dreams

Showing posts with label Dreams. Show all posts

Tuesday, November 15, 2016

How to Make Sure your Child is Getting Enough Hours of Sleep

Getting enough hours of sleep is key to make sure they have the necessary energy.

Sleep is one of the main physiological needs for the human body. It’s those precious hours of rest that our body uses to renovate its cells, to recharge, and prepare every part of it to face another day. As a key factor for our overall health, it’s important to make sure kids cultivate sleep as a healthy habit since infancy that will benefit their well-being. However, when you are the caretaker of a child with special needs, it’s important that you monitor their sleeping patterns to help them get the correct amount of rest that will give them the energy to tackle down their day by day with a great mood.

Sleep deprivation is the main concern with these kids as this is one of the things that could affect their daily behavior. It could cause problems with concentration, and sometimes it makes them prone to behavioral distress due to the feeling of exhaustion. For parents and caretakers, these are signs that while not limited to sleep problems, are clear indicators beyond the under eye bags. Kids without proper repose can also face other sets of complications, as being exhausted takes a toll on their bodies. Spending hours without proper rest can lead to hallucinations, aggressiveness, migraine and high blood pressure just to name a few. But there are many things that you can do to ensure they are getting the necessary hours of slumber to maintain their health. First of all, make sure you create a correct environment for them to rest, and you can use the following advice:

Put a nightlight: This will help them feel more safe, as it will avoid the dreaded pitch-dark look of a room in the night. If your child is particularly sensitive to light, you can offer them the option of using a click-on light that they can push if needed throughout the night.

Take out distracting electronics: While in some cases electronic devices need to be present in your child’s room, make sure to take out all unnecessary elements out of the bedroom. Tablets, computers, and videogames can create the incorrect environment for rest.

Keep it clean: Some kids feel stressed and anxious in messy spaces and those emotions could interfere in how they reach the state of relaxation that allows them to sleep. In this sense, you need to keep those areas organized as it will take out that stress factor.

But more than setting the environment, you need to take the extra step into making them realize that their rest time is important and a key element to ensure their health. This might come across as something incredibly hard to process for a child, but I can assure you they will understand why they need to do it and will be more than willing to incorporate rest into their everyday lives if you let them know why they must do it in a more friendly way. Another set of things you can do to help them reach that relaxed state is:

Set a routine: Most of the time, kids like things when they are consistent, and you as a caretaker, should get used to these routines. Create one for sleep-time, like having tea or a warm glass of milk after the night bath. Stick with it as it will resound and work as the starter for the sleeping time.

Relaxing bath : A soak in tempered water and a massage can help your kid feel relaxed before heading off to bed. This helps their body fall into the sleepy state needed to allow a restful night.

Soothe them: Some kids like to listen to relaxing music or do something in particular which makes them feel calm. Make sure to incorporate these soothing elements as part of their pre-sleep habit to help them feel safe and comforted.

Avoid using it as a tool: You can let them know the importance of sleep for their lives, but don’t use it as a tool. Remember kids interpret things due to their associations, so make sure you relate sleep to something relaxing, not to a task or a punishment.

Use transitional objects: As you know, most kids appreciate having a teddy bear or any other toy as a fixed item in their bed routine. These are transitional elements that help them soothe themselves and comprehend that it’s time to go to bed.

Every child will have a different need and behavior when it comes to resting time, and you need to do everything you can to make sure they get the most out of every single hour of sleep they get. Figure out a pattern that works for both of you, stick to it and do everything you need to in order to allow them to recharge their bodies for the next day. This is especially important if they are doing extra physical exercise, like having a soccer game. For this same reason, Autism Soccer encourages kids in their classes to get enough hours of slumber, as it will give them the energy to face every activity throughout the day. Contact them to give your child the opportunity to enjoy soccer with the help of professionals!

If kids are well-rested, they'll have more energy to do things that make them happy.

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Tuesday, November 8, 2016

How to Use Motivation as a Driving Force for Kids

You feel motivated when you reach your goals; the same thing goes for children.

Think for a second on what makes you do the things you do. For example, take something that you love doing, whether it is working or just a hobby, and find out why you do it. Is it because it gives you a reward, like money or sheer happiness about completing a task? That certain force that makes you keep on going or trying new things and practicing is called “motivation”. it is the fact that at the end of the rope, there’s something waiting for you, whether it is something material or not, which gives you a feeling of accomplishment.

For us adults, it is important, but for kids, it’s the driving force for their actions, and what keeps them learning and experimenting new things in order to achieve success as they know it. But sometimes, parents and teachers don’t quite know how important it is and don’t take the extra steps to ensure that children are motivated throughout their lives to make them feel happy and comfortable. Today I’m going to explain to you how important is is for you to use motivation as a tool to make them grow in confidence.

Why motivation?

During these formative years, is important to teach them how to do things that make them happy and the importance of achieving their goals through hard work. This is when motivation comes in handy, because more than ordering them to do something, you are using their own minds and hearts to steer them into the right direction. This means that they must relate to the people around them in order to work together. This is in no way an indication that you should reward every sort of behavior, regardless of its nature. Work with them to figure out what makes them feel happy and fulfilled and use these elements to make sure they are motivated throughout their day.

How can I motivate?

Motivation is an all-over inclusive process, and it requires certain amounts of effort from parents, teachers, and coaches to increase its impact in children’s lives. With that in mind, you need to let go of the notions of motivation through giving prices, as this creates a feel of loss when they don’t reach a goal. More than sticking to the traditional reward system, you need to make sure these incentives purely based on the comforting feeling they will get when they work hard to reach their goals, regardless of the final outcome. Use the eventual setbacks as lessons, and teach them that while they didn’t achieve what they wanted, they gained experience and other particular things according to the case, making them feel like winners either way. I’ll give you some tips on how to motivate:

Use creative rewards (and make sure they are fulfilling to the child).
Praise their strengths and achievements.
Use your actions as an example.
Teach them how to handle setbacks.

What are you doing to keep your child motivated? Use these pieces of advice to make sure that you kid is working towards reaching their goals in the right way! With the help of organizations like Autism Soccer, you can be sure they will make them reach their goals in a cooperative setting that will impulse their dreams.

Once kids know the main objetives, they work to reach their goals.

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Friday, November 4, 2016

Autism: Getting to Know the People in the Spectrum

You can start by learning about the autism spectrum and get to know the people affected by it.

Over the years, much has been said about autism, and one of the main topics of conversation goes around this being one of the diseases without origin than even years after its discovery, it still baffles doctors and scientists. According to the CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention), at least 1 in every 68 children is diagnosed within the Autistic Spectrum. This is, by definition, the group of developmental disorders that has different levels of pervasion into the lives of the ones who suffer it, which affects mildly or severely their abilities to socialize with others. This, however, doesn’t totally limit their interaction skills, which allows them to work with therapists to improve their quality of life. But there’s more beyond the diagnoses of these individuals, and I want you to learn about people within the autism spectrum disorder (ASD).

Most of them are diagnosed with this disease as kids, around the time they start showing signs of this disorder. The first signs might show when they are toddlers, so it's important to learn about the main indicators in order to take action right away. There are certain behaviors that you should pay attention to:

Socialization problems: As people with ASD don’t pick up the usual social cues that indicate anger, disappointment, and emotions in general, it’s hard for them to communicate and socialize. This means they could be baffled by human behavior, which sometimes can make them feel self-doubtful.
Difficulty responding: Names are a common way of addressing people, but for kids and people with ASD, these are not easily interpreted as ways of being called into attention. They have difficulty responding to their names, and even to direct calls of attention, and as such, these are interpreted as signs of being drawn back and introverted.
Emotional outbursts: Difficulties dealing with emotions can lead to frustration, and those, in turn, can lead to bursts of rage, anger and overall aggressive behaviors triggered by things that we often consider menial. They can respond incredibly strong to small problems, which can lead to emotional meltdowns.
Obsessive routines: People with ASD often require organization and routine to feel comfortable. As a result, they usually have precise and repetitive routines without alterations, which can transform into obsessive behavior. Any change in them makes them feel extremely anxious and could even generate self-harm.
Echolalia: This is an infant speech pattern that can permeate into ASD patients’ lives even after their formative years. Repetition of words might help them comprehend and communicate, as sometimes, they are unable to respond directly to people addressing them.
Voice tone: In some cases, these kids keep the usual small child way of talking in a sing-song tone with not completely connected phrases, or display a grown-up speech pattern. In other instances, they develop a robot-like tone, without the inflections that they can not pick up in tone, such as questions, scoldings and so on.
Over Stimuli: People with ASD have problems dealing with emotions and big crowds, and many have problems with noises too, as these are seen as strong stimulants for them. This affects them and causes them to feel overly saturated, making them prone to burst or shutdowns, where they retract even more. They might feel this way about interactions that we often consider normal social settings, but for them turn to be very uncomfortable.
Eye contact: One of the most frequently talked-about symptoms of ASD is the lack of visual interaction with others. People within the autism spectrum don’t pick up that social clue either, and most of the time they avoid making eye contact, which makes them look drawn back and reclusive and works as a red flag to their condition.
Physical interaction: Behaviors like hugging, touching and overall physical touch might be a little too much for kids within the spectrum, and they will withdraw from interacting with people that way. They are respectful of their personal space and don’t appreciate people invading it. They can react more aggressively than expected to this, but flinching and stepping back are the main responses.
Extreme behavior: They are either too passive or too active and there usually is no in-between, which is also met with extreme responses to situations, specially when those are changes they had not contemplated or weren’t given any indication, nor time to adjust.
Repetitive movements: Rocking back and forth, hand flapping, toe curling, pacing and such are often considered key symptoms of ASD and can be found in almost the totality of kids with that condition. This also works as a red flag and can be triggered or permanent, depending on the severity and particular condition of the child.

These are just a few of the signs that people within the autistic spectrum disorder showcase, and they work as frequent indicators that the kid needs to be examined by a doctor to corroborate the diagnosis. If that’s the case, and you want your kid to interact with others in an inclusive sport setting that makes them feel comfortable, you need to visit Autism Soccer. This organization exists solely with the purpose of teaching kids the love for sports in a fun and creative way, so that you can be sure that your kid is working with professionals to make the most out of practicing a physical activity!

This condition has no explanation, but this doesn't mean they can't live their lives to the fullest.

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Thursday, November 3, 2016

Autism Soccer: The Benefits of Playing Sports

Everyone benefits from practicing sports, and that's why Autism Soccer looks for ways to make it more accessible to special children.

In today's world, we see new advice on almost everything we do. New techniques and ideas that can modify the way we see our everyday lives and that help us comprehend the importance of learning other things. Something that is taking a turn for the better is the use of sports as a treatment option for certain conditions. In fact, as physical exercise is often considered one of the pillars of health, it’s used as an alternative therapy to behavioral and developmental disabilities. This is especially favorable for kids, as it makes them feel involved and safe while doing exercise. In fact, people love initiatives that foment the incorporation of sports as an integral part of their lives, and this is especially great when it’s a collaborative effort.

Keeping that in mind, I’m going to teach you a few benefits that playing sports offers children:

Developing discipline: Having a structure while doing physical exercise is key to developing discipline. This means that the more kids practice, the more result they’ll see and their motivation will skyrocket. It also makes them aware that rewards take time and dedication, which will give them the chance to develop a strong sense of perseverance.

Motivational Boost: Discipline and motivation go hand to hand and while many people think they are abysmally different, the truth is they are correlated. Discipline allows kids to see results which in turn, will make them feel better and they’ll keep on practicing said sport. It also makes them want to share with others.

Stress reduction: Physical exercise gives children a release from tension and stress that they might be accumulating and it helps them use their energy in a productive manner, reducing the chance of outbursts and crisis. It also offers them a line of action that helps them maintain their minds in a set goal.

Improves motor skills: This is probably one of the main benefits of practicing sports, as it makes people who practice them improve their muscle tone, coordination, and overall physical health. It also liberates endorphins, which make them feel happy and joyful, increasing the benefits they obtain from the practice.

That’s exactly the reason why Autism Soccer goes all the way and teaches a cooperative sport like soccer to children! In this organization we work with kids with different kinds of disabilities in a friendly environment, making for a fun time while fomenting love for physical exercise through soccer.

They not only offer exercise, but also a way to interact in an inclusive and supportive environment.

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15165 NW 77 Ave Suite 1005 Miami Lakes FL 33014

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Tuesday, November 1, 2016

The Goal of Autism Soccer: Teaching soccer in a supportive environment

Teamwork is a great way to teach people how to work together and experience the world in a different way.

Sports have the potential to bring people together, especially children, and to show them qualities that will have a lasting impact in their lives in the future. That’s even more important for special kids, as they need to exercise in a way that offers them the opportunity to express themselves and be their authentic selves, without the dread of being judged and among people who know exactly how to work with them in order for them to harvest great benefits from practicing soccer. Autism Soccer’s goal is to make something incredible out of their experience, founding a strong relationship among team members, regardless of their special need.

This goal is at the heart of every action they take. They mix physical growth with a gentle and firm direction, allowing the benefits of exercise to work their magic on kids. This is paired with the supportive environment that it’s required to make sure they have a chance of learning and expressing themselves and to relate to other children that resound with them in a positive way. However, there’s more to it: it’s proven that sports have an impact on more than one level, and team playing brings people together in unique ways, and this is incredibly important for kids with special needs. It means that they are treated like members of a group, while feeling protected and encouraged to increase their participation, forming important bonds and helping them control their physical impulses in an organized setting. Another goal is to use sports as a vessel for communication, as this enhances their social skills, as well as their self-esteem, as they see their efforts turn into results in the matches they play.

Sometimes, sports can make people feel connected and safe, and that alone is the best goal organizations strive to achieve while working with kids. That’s the reason why Autism Soccer’s initiative is so important for people working with these kind of children. They are responsible for stimulating them into growing integrally through physical activities.