Visual Discrimination Activities

Sticker Spy Game for Kids Who Are Developmentally Delayed

Jul 31, 2008 Lynn Moore

Children with cognitive delays can practice visual discrimination with a game made of stickers and poster board.

Kids love the “spy” books, and yet the busy background is just too hard for some. If your child has a developmental delay (cognitive or visual) you can make a simple game to practice visual discrimination.

Gather Some Simple Supplies To make this game, you will need a sheet of poster board, some index cards that have been cut in half, and stickers. The stickers should be pairs of items. For example, you might have two identical stickers for a blue car, two identical stickers for a striped hot air balloon, etc. Get ten pairs of stickers in all. The words for the stickers should be ones that you want your child to learn. You might have ten pairs of fruit stickers (apple, grapes, banana, orange, peach, pineapple, pear, cherry, blueberry, and strawberry.) You might have ten pairs of transportation stickers (car, truck, boat, airplane, bicycle, van, bus, hot air balloon, scooter, and motorcycle).

Build the Game in Just a Few Minutes Putting the game together is the easy part. Put one sticker from each of the pairs on the poster board. Spread them out. The stickers may be turned in various directions.

Take the remaining stickers and put one on each of the index card halves.

Play the Game for Hours of Learning Fun Turn the sicker cards upside down in a stack. Have your child draw a card. Perhaps the card is an apple. Say: It is an apple. Do you see an apple? Have your child point to the apple on the game board and say I see the apple. Repeat with the other cards.

Try a variation of the game with two children. Have them take turns drawing cards and finding the sticker match on the board.

Try a Harder Version of the Game You can make endless versions of this game depending on the materials you use and the words that you want your child to learn. Try using wrapping paper with a design to challenge your child with the visual discrimination portion. You can also mix up the kinds of stickers that you use. They do not have to all be from the same category. You might have some food stickers, some toy stickers, and some animal stickers.

Take the Game around Your Home You can also try the game by putting the cards in clear view around one room of your house. Sit with your child in a central location and have him point out the sticker cards as he sees them. Encourage him to use sentences like I see a monkey or I see the crackers.

By starting with a list of words and a few inexpensive supplies you can create hours of visual discrimination and vocabulary practice with your child.

The copyright of the article Visual Discrimination Activities in Special Needs Parenting is owned by Lynn Moore. Permission to republish Visual Discrimination Activities in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.

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