Article - Creating a Sensory Space for your Child at Home this Christmas. Things to Consider!

In the busy hustle and bustle of the Christmas season, some children may seek out a dedicated quiet space at home to support self-regulation. We have some advice and guidance below on how to help with that.

What is Sensory Processing?

Sensory processing refers to the way the nervous system receives, interprets, and responds to sensory information from the environment. Our brain receives messages from our sensory receptors and in turn we respond with appropriate motor and behavioural responses. This is a complex neurological process that plays a crucial role in how we interact with and adapt to our surroundings.

Often children and people with Autism and or children and people with sensory processing difficulties will respond differently to sensory stimuli. For a moment think of your brain as a computer with connections resembling wires linking various parts of your brain to your nervous system. These wires and connections send messages to us to aid us in processing, interpreting, and responding to our sensory surroundings.

In individuals and children with autism, research has found that the connections between different areas of the brain are different from typically developing individuals, and so they have differences processing sensory stimuli and may respond with unusual or atypical behaviours.

There are multiple ways that we can support individuals and children with Autism in many different settings. For the purpose of this article we are going to outline some simple things to consider when creating a supportive sensory space at home for your child.

The most important thing to remember is that every child is unique and will present with their own very individual sensory profile. Often people will over generalise and think that all children and individuals with Autism “need deep pressure” or “weighted blankets” or “hate noise”. This often may be the case, but it is not always the case. Every situation is always different and so we need to ensure that the unique and individual needs of the person we are supporting is at the very centre of everything that we do.

Creating a Sensory Environment for your Child!

So, we are going to consider how to build a sensory space through the lens of our seven senses.

Proprioception (Body Awareness) Tactile (Touch) Vestibular (Movement) Visual (Sight), Olfactory (Smell) Gustatory (Taste), Auditory (Hearing).

Every human being will have their own unique sensory profile where they will seek or avoid certain stimuli related to the seven senses. This is the same for children and individuals with Autism except their responses may appear less or atypical than what we might expect. So, the most important thing for you to do is to observe your child. Look out for what they are seeking and what they like to spend time engaging with, also observe what are the stimuli in the environment your child tries to avoid. Your observations will help you to build up an individual sensory profile for your child. You may wish to consult a professional (Occupational Therapist) to assess your child and this is always advisable. However, if this is not feasible for you, remember that you too are the expert of your own child and for the sake of creating a supportive sensory space for your child consider the following:

Creating a sensory space at home does not need to be a complicated or onerous project. Simply identifying a corner in a room and designating this space as “Jack’s Space” with a label or a photograph can be enough. Sometimes people use small tents, large blankets, etc.. to set up a sensory space at home. All children will attract to a space like this at home.

If your child seeks proprioceptive input to support their regulation, they may like to have the following objects, activities available in a sensory space.

Body Sock, Weighted Blanket, Access to Deep Pressure, Light Brushing.

Please remember to observe the effect of the above, and if your child is demonstrating avoidance and dislike, be sure not to impose any of these activities or objects on them.

The following list will help you to consider the types of activities and objects that you can make available in the sensory space.

Vestibular (Movement)

Seeking Peanut Ball, Exercise Ball

Visual (Seeing)

Seeking Spinning Objects, Bright Objects, Reflective objects, (for example kaleidoscope)

Avoidance Keep the space visually neutral, perhaps plain and soft calming visual stimuli.

Auditory (Hearing)

Seeking Percussion objects, drums, headphones with favourite music and sounds

Avoiding Keep the space calm and quiet and if possible away from external loud auditory stimuli

Tactile (Touch)

Seeking Fidget Objects, Body Sock, Weighted Blanket, Theraputty, Playdoh, Messy Play

Avoiding Some children will demonstrate a deep aversion to Thera putty, Playdoh, and or Messy Play. That is totally okay and we need to make sure we don’t push those activities on them.

Olfactory (Smelling

Seeking Smells and Scents scented candles, notes, stickers, lotions

Avoiding Ventilation

As mentioned earlier, all children are different. You know your child best. Observing their reactions and responses to different stimuli, will help you to decide what is best when supporting their regulation during the busy Christmas period.