Re: Imaginative Play?-Imitation

[Guest guest]

My son imitates everyone, too. Is that common? It is amazing how he

picks up facial expressions, phrases, or movements that people make!

He actually performs for us. I just assumed Zacky will do anything

for a laugh.

Violet (Zacky 10 yrs old, ds with no offical autism diagnosis, yet)

> My son is not diagnosed with autism, but he fits the ds-asd profile

> extremely well. One thing I've always wondered about is the lack of

> imaginative play that is typical with autism. I don't think my son

> lacks imaginative play. He plays with his stuffed animals and

> characters. They sign. They help him do things. They dance. They do

> gymnastics. He pretends that he is cooking or eating. He feeds me

> imaginary food and serves me imaginary tea. He plays with cars and

> trains. He makes dinosaurs roar, pigs oink , and so on. He puts his

> stuffed characters to bed and covers them nicely for a nap. He

> pretends he is on stage, singing into his microphone and bowing at

> the end. He is even humorous, in a slapstick kind of way. He is an

> entertainer at heart. He dresses up like other people. He pretends

> he is them by taking on their mannerisms. He loves it when you

> notice who he is imitating. He puts on my reading glasses, gets a

> book or a paper and pen, and pretends he is me. His favorite person

> to imitate is his dad.He puts on Dad's soccer shorts or a vest,

> slings a bag over his shoulder, pulls his cell phone out of his

> pocket and gives it a cool flip, and pretends he is off to work. If

> you don't watch him, he will get a computer and a real cell phone

> to put in the bag. He's really into pretending he is talking on a

> cell phone. He is a kinesthetic learner and often really captures

> the essence of people's gestures,like the way he flips open his

> cell phone. His imaginative play includes only a little

> verbalization, since he is largely non-verbal, but it sure seems

> imaginative to me. He does have plenty of weird ways to play. He

> does do a lot of imitative play. He makes his stuffed characters do

> things he doesn't want to do(like sign thank you or wave to daddy

> over the telephone or on the webcam) or things he knows he is not

> supposed to do. He uses objects in unconventional ways. Some of

> that seems to be to show more imagination.Anything slightly

> cylindrical can become a microphone. When he was young he had the

> video Wee Sing Under the Sea. Whenever the little boy in the story

> took his bucket and filled it with seashells , he found something

> to play the roll of the bucket and did the same. The type of

> objects that stood in for the bucket at various times is what made

> this both imaginative and strange. He could take just about

> anything and pretend it was a bucket. He does a lot of other weird

> things to amuse himself, like slip books and videos through the

> wooden slats under the couch, or lining them around the couch seat

> or on the windowsill. (At almost 14, he is still working on totally

> destroying every book we own.) But much of the time his play is

> quite imaginative. I'm quite imaginative, in my own way, but

> imaginative play never was something I was into, even as a kid. I

> never dreamed of being an actress. I'm more of the inventor type or

> the type to try to solve problems imaginatively, to work with

> paradigms, to come up with ideas about what might work to help my

> son with this or that issue. No one else in the family is into

> imaginative play, either, so he didn't learn any of this from

> us.I'd love to hear about other people's experiences in this area.

> Kids with ds-asd tend to be different in some ways from kids with

> autism but not ds. I'm curious if this is one of the areas, or if

> my kid is just the odd one among the ds-asd kids.Janice

>

>

[Guest guest]

<<My son imitates everyone, too. Is that common? It is amazing how he

picks up facial expressions, phrases, or movements that people make!

He actually performs for us.>>

Again absolutely no imitation skills; we have to drill them and work very hard

to see anything like imitation ffrom . I'm starting to think she must have

a severe form of autism.:-(

Sherry

[Guest guest]

How many people do you know who are NEURO TYPICAL who are the same as any

other person?? Our kids are just like the normative population - some do

some things and some do others. As my friend was heard to say - " We all put

our pants on the same way - one leg at a time - EXCEPT for MY CHILD - he

likes to put both legs on at once!!! " And that is what makes us

individuals.

>

> <<My son imitates everyone, too. Is that common? It is amazing how he

> picks up facial expressions, phrases, or movements that people make!

> He actually performs for us.>>

>

> Again absolutely no imitation skills; we have to drill them and work very

> hard to see anything like imitation ffrom . I'm starting to think she

> must have a severe form of autism.:-(

> Sherry

>

>

[Guest guest]

Sara! I love it!

Liz

Re: Imaginative Play?-Imitation

How many people do you know who are NEURO TYPICAL who are the same as any

other person?? Our kids are just like the normative population - some do

some things and some do others. As my friend was heard to say - " We all put

our pants on the same way - one leg at a time - EXCEPT for MY CHILD - he

likes to put both legs on at once!!! " And that is what makes us

individuals.

>

> <<My son imitates everyone, too. Is that common? It is amazing how he

> picks up facial expressions, phrases, or movements that people make!

> He actually performs for us.>>

>

> Again absolutely no imitation skills; we have to drill them and work very

> hard to see anything like imitation ffrom . I'm starting to think she

> must have a severe form of autism.:-(

> Sherry

>

>

[Guest guest]

<<How many people do you know who are NEURO TYPICAL who are the same as any

other person?? Our kids are just like the normative population - some do

some things and some do others.>>

You know in thinking more about this....I would venture a guess that there is

about 90% less imaginative play going on with all kids now that they are all

hooked up to electronics.

I've always thought might have shown more progress in this area if she had

had a sibling but who knows?

Sherry