Lesson SEN 32
Task: Lace a string through a card.
Prerequisites: SEN 12—SEN 14
Concept: Fine-motor skills are greatly required in this task. The nondominant hand must hold a card fairly steady while the dominant hand places the string through the appropriate holes. The action performed is a sewing-like action that uses much greater distances and larger materials. Useful applications beyond possible entertainment are skills employed in some vocational or workshop settings. Behavioral Objective: When requested to "please lace up this card," the student will place the provided string through the holes, going from one hole to the next, until at least 10 holes have received the string to a 90% accuracy level for 20 trials.
Materials: These types of materials can be obtained from kits, but a very successful alternative is to back familiar pictures with poster board and to punch holes around the outline.
Task Analysis:
1. Practice with the student the ability to hold the card in the nondominant hand, using a full-hand grasp, and pointing the picture toward the student.
2. Assist the student in picking up the string in the dominant hand and holding it in a pincer grasp that exposes about 1 inch of string past the thumb and forefinger.
3. Combine the concepts from Steps 1 and 2 so that they can be performed at the same time.
4. Physically guide the student through the process of lacing the card. Start by going in a hole from the picture side and coming up through the back of the card
5. Reduce all physical guidance until only verbal step-by-step prompts are needed.
6. Fade all prompting until using just the total-task request: "Please lace up this card."