Planning a Sensory Garden for the Autistic Child

You can make a 'Little Corner of the World' garden for your autistic child where he can take a 'sensory break' and get away from the demands of the world around him.

Autistic children can have many sensory issues. Some children react negatively to loud sounds, pungent odors, and other visual and auditory overload issues.

The goal of a special therapeutic garden for an autistic child is to provide a safe space with elements to help the child maintain a baseline of arousal but avoid sensory overload.

Designing a Sensory Garden:

Choose a quiet place in your yard to make this special garden. Fence the area for safety and have a gate that can be secured as autistic children do not always understand the concept of danger and often wander away.

Use plantings, vines and other vegetation on and around the fencing to screen out excessive auditory and visual stimuli. Also, install a simple bubbling or cascading fountain to help mask sounds and provide soothing sounds of water.

Design the garden to keep distractions to a minimum. If space is not an issue, create a variety of specialized areas to accommodate a wide variety of therapeutic needs the child may have such as an area for sensory integration activities, another for gross and fine motor skills, and a free-play area.

To stimulate the visual, tactile, olfactory, auditory and other systems, a variety of surfaces should be included--brick, pea gravel, sand, bark chips, slate, stones, grass, soil etc. as well as plants with a variety of leaf textures, colors, shapes, sizes and, perhaps fragrances.

In a quiet area of the therapeutic garden include a sand table and water table for sensory play. Other objects such as pinwheels, wind chimes, flags and wind socks are good to engage the senses.

Include opportunities for the child to develop gross motor skills and exercise large muscle groups by adding objects for climbing such as large boulders, stumps, nets, a balancing beam or a horizontal ladder resting on the ground, and stepping stones placed several inches apart for jumping and 'giant steps'.

To help increase upper body strength be sure to include a rope swing, rings or a short horizontal bar. A separate grassy area is good for running and active games.

Sensory plants to Include in a Therapeutic Sensory Garden:

Lemon, Lime and Cinnamon Basil, Chocolate Mint, Orange Mint, Rosemary, Lamb's Ear, Pampas Grass, Strawflower, various grasses, violets, Roses, Honeysuckle, Sunflowers, Marigolds, Chameleon Plant, Greater Quaking Grass, Love-in-a-Mist, Bamboo, Silver Sage, Jerusalem Sage, Houseleek, Curry plant, Lavender, Chocolate Cosmos, Sweet pea, Heuchera 'Chocolate Ruffles', Nasturtium, Wild Strawberry

Source: Doreen Bradley Satter, RN