Snow Days and task baskets

Okay, sorry I haven't been writing lately missed a couple of weeks due to stomach bug, and a funeral that was back in Kentucky. Was wonderful seeing so many family members that I had not seen in a while, but it was really cold.
 Now  that winter has arrived in Oklahoma I have had a couple of  "Snow Days", which I like to call my "Winter Catch-up Days." I can catch up on things that I need to do for my class such as make new work task, paper work, and start preparing for my spring IEP madness.
So now you are wondering; "What the heck is a Task basket?" Task basket were developed by the program TEACCH (www.teacch.com) for autism students who are as we all know  visual learner; one of the basic principals is visual structure. So to help students learn we apply this principal to a visual task box or basket. Most students start out learning with shoe box task. These are self contained activities and students can see how much work there is to do and can tell what to do with the material just by looking at the contents. These activities are designed to work as a teacher directed activity to introduce new skill then have the student do it independently as the student becomes more comfortable with the skill.
Task baskets can be purchased from companies pre-made, which my school and myself has done:
Shoebox task
HOT ideas
There are many others but these are the two that I have ordered from and know that are great.

So here are some nice things about making work task, use the internet to find the things you need. I love that Pinterest has great resources for autism task baskets. Just type in Teacch or Task basket ; you get a lot of boards to look at and pin. I have a board for Autism that I have pinned a lot of  task ideas on .
Pinterest
Books:
How do I teach this kid
Task Galore is a great book and they also have stuff on Pinterest.  Here are some ideas from their book.

 

 

Task Galore

 

This is a task for color matching made from pegs and an egg carton.

Task you can make with stuff you have at home. I actually have a 3 drawer plastic container full of stuff I keep just to make new task. You can make task for any age and cognitive ability with items you have at home.

If you want to find things that you can just print off and laminate here are some great web site that I have used for years.

Childcare Land - Early learning Activities She has free printable, videos to show how to use her games, also as a subscription that you can get lots of printable and it is very reasonably priced.

Pre-K pages printables- She has some free and some you can purchase.

File Folder Farm- all grade level file folder games. Some you do have to purchase

Teachers pay teachers- you will have to build an account which is free and some items are free or very cheap. It is a great site and so glad it is available to everyone.

Building Blox- lots of free printables and great ideas.

 Just remember make it fun and on the days your child is having difficulties set up a work area with lots of task baskets. They will have fun and you will too.