Promoting early play

Early forms of play involving the exploration of objects is repetitive and limited in scope in children with autism, consistent with a weak drive towards central coherence. The importance is stressed of early manipulative and relational play for the development of meaningful perceptual representations and the subsequent development of functional and symbolic play. It is argued that intervention designed to promote these early forms of play is therefore of critical importance. A 'toy-play' intervention programme is described that was initially used in a research setting with 24 children with autism, using outcome measures and a 1 year follow-up assessment. The original intervention was successful. However, improvements in play were not maintained unless children continued to receive play support. A 'play stimulation' programme building on the toy-play programme is therefore now carried out with children in small groups after completion of the one-to-one toy-play programme.