Znaczenie zabawki w terapii autyzmu Wybrane aspekty
The Meaning of a Toy in Autism Therapy

Summary/Abstract: The article is a sketch constituting a fragment of scientific consideration of a toy understood as a therapeutic tool. The subject of deliberations is a work of speech therapist with autistic children at the pre-school age, with special focus on the therapy of social competences, understanding emotions, learning a language and logical thinking, practicing memory, as well motivational aspects of a toy. The purpose of the article is to show the function of a toy in autistic child therapy. Therefore, the text should be read as a kind of guide on the possibility of using the toy mainly in the speech-therapist’s office (as it has been written from the speech therapist’s point of view), however, it is addressed to all people working with children – including psychologists, pedagogues, carers and parents. The suggested usage of toys is applied and verified in therapy based on the method of individual work with a disturbed child, and the participatory observation method was used to collect research materials for the article.Significant conclusions from the observations include:- toys play an important role in the therapy of social behavior, as the whole therapeutic process aims at shaping social competences, and the use of toys also gives the opportunity to continue playing outside the speech-therapist’s office;- a toy is a great tool supporting speech development, it facilitates the introduction and consolidation of grammatical categories;- toys inspire group activities, which have highly therapeutic functions;- toys motivate the child to actively participate in therapy.

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