Identifying Appropriate Clothing

Children with ASD can find the long-term goal of getting dressed difficult to master. For children with ASD, dressing can be a daunting task, and so can choosing appropriate clothing for the weather or a social situation. In order to help your child master the long-term goal of getting dressed, you can work with your child on the short-term goal of identifying appropriate clothing. Wearing clothing appropriate for a situation may decrease teasing or bullying. The ability to select appropriate clothing also encourages independence and teaches your child important life skills. 

The following strategies may help your child make progress towards mastering the short-term goal of identifying appropriate clothing (e.g., for the weather or a social situation):

• Use visual aids for matching. Print pictures of different types of clothing for different seasons: shorts and t-shirt for summer, heavier coat with hat and gloves for the winter, long sleeves and long pants for spring and fall, etc. Print a second set of  pictures showing a landscape with different seasons and teach your child to match appropriate clothing to the season pictured. Use positive reinforcement to encourage them to learn to match the type of clothing to the season: offer a piece of candy, a small toy, etc. Once they can match seasonal clothing, add weather appropriate clothing picture matching (e.g., rain clothing, snow clothing, windy clothing, etc.), followed by situation-specific clothing (e.g., swimsuit, pajamas, etc.) and reward successful matching. Phase out the positive reinforcement when the skill has been sufficiently acquired. If the reinforcer for the behavior is a tangible item, such as a small snack or a token for a token board, ensure that it is provided with a great deal of verbal praise. Ideally, you want your child’s positive behaviors to be supported solely by social reinforcement. You can also use flash cards as follows to help guide your child to appropriate clothing choices on a given day:

• Activity 1. Weather

1. Select an image (such as a flash card) that corresponds with the current weather. 
2. Select image(s) (such as a flash card) of appropriate clothing for the weather. For example, in the winter, a hat, pants, a sweater, jacket, etc. would be appropriate. 
3. Retrieve the items of clothing that are appropriate for the weather from a dresser, closet, etc.

• Activity 2. Situation/Scenario: 

1. Lay out four-five items of clothing that are for very specific scenarios. For example, you can lay out a bathing suit, pajamas, a winter hat, dressy/formal clothes, and flip-flops/sandals.
2. Decide/discuss what the scenario is (e.g., “Today we are going to the beach where it will be warm and we will swim.”)
3. Select items of clothing that apply to the given situation.

• Schedule a clothing discussion before bedtime every evening. Discuss tomorrow’s weather with your child as part of the bedtime routine. Ask your child to indicate what type of clothing they should wear the following day based on the weather forecast. You may choose to use positive reinforcement to encourage your child to identify the type of clothing appropriate for the weather forecast: offer a piece of candy, a small toy, read an extra bedtime story, etc. This positive reinforcement may also come as the reward of completing a bedtime routine, or for completing all scheduled activities in a given day. Phase out the positive reinforcement when the skill has been sufficiently acquired. If the reinforcer for the behavior is a tangible item, such as a small snack or a token for a token board, ensure that it is provided with a great deal of verbal praise. Ideally, you want your child’s positive behaviors to be supported solely by social reinforcement.
• Place the clothes out in the evening for the following day. Once your child can match the type of clothing to the weather forecast, work with your child before bed to lay out clothes for the following morning. Start by giving your child a few options of clothes to choose from, and progress to allowing your child to independently select their clothes for the following day. You may choose to use positive reinforcement to encourage them to put their clothes out for the following day: offer a piece of candy, a small toy, read an extra bedtime story, etc. This positive reinforcement may also come as the reward of completing a bedtime routine, or for completing all scheduled activities in a given day. Phase out the positive reinforcement when the skill has been sufficiently acquired. If the reinforcer for the behavior is a tangible item, such as a small snack or a token for a token board, ensure that it is provided with a great deal of verbal praise. Ideally, you want your child’s positive behaviors to be supported solely by social reinforcement. 
• Additional resources

• Clothes on Different Weather - Bing video
• Clean vs Dirty Clothing - Social Story by AdvanceSPOT | TPT (teacherspayteachers.com)
• SOCIAL STORY-GETTING DRESSED // animated social story - YouTube
• Winter Clothes Flashcards PDF Free Printable for Kids - Ten Worksheets
• Printable Summer and Winter Clothing Sort - From ABCs to ACTs
• Weather Wear Matching | Worksheet | Education.com

In order to help your child master the short-term goal of identifying appropriate clothing, you can choose a target such as identifying weather-appropriate clothing, or identifying situation-appropriate clothing.

Identifying if clothing is appropriate for weather

Step 1: Decide what type of clothing you would like your child to learn to identify. For example, you can choose the target of identifying weather-appropriate clothing while working on the short-term goal of identifying appropriate clothing. For example, it is winter and you are teaching your child to identify clothing based on the current weather. Select three pictures as follows: one image (flash card) of appropriate clothing for winter (e.g., hat, jacket, scarf, gloves), one image (flash card) of appropriate clothing for summer (e.g., shorts, sandals, sunglasses, straw hat), and an image (flash card) with a winter/snow landscape. 

Step 2: An initial/specific discriminative stimulus (SD) should be selected that will cue your child that the task will start. This SD can be a visual SD, such as the flashcard with the winter/snow landscape, or a verbal SD (“Time to pick out something to wear when it’s cold!”).

Step 3: Collect baseline level data by providing the SD from Step 2 and allowing your child to attempt to independently identify the clothing for which you prompted. The baseline level will vary according to your child and their specific abilities. As an example, you can count how many times in a row your child is able to independently identify the clothing you prompted for. Alternatively, you can count how many times within a given time interval (e.g., 5 min, 10 min, 15 min, etc.) your child was able to independently identify the clothing you prompted for. 

Step 4: To begin the trial to monitor progress towards meeting the target (i.e., the target of identifying weather-appropriate clothing), provide the SD from Step 2 and allow your child to attempt independently. When your child is successful, provide reinforcement. If the reinforcer for the behavior is a tangible item, such as a small snack or a token for a token board, ensure that it is provided with a great deal of verbal praise. Ideally, you want your child’s positive behavior to be supported solely by social reinforcement. If the behavior was not displayed, end the trial and provide the appropriate level of prompting on the following trial. For example, you can show your child the two corresponding images (image of hat and winter scene) and say “When the weather is cold, we wear a hat.”

Step 5: Collect data on how your child makes progress. For example, count how many times in a row your child can meet the target of identifying weather-appropriate clothing independently. Alternatively, you can track progress by recording how long it takes your child to meet the target of identifying weather-appropriate clothing independently. Or, alternatively, you can track progress by counting the number of successful attempts at identifying weather-appropriate clothing during a session. 

Step 6: Track how your child makes progress to meet the target of identifying weather-appropriate clothing by comparing with either a number threshold or a percentage threshold (necessary to meet the target). For example, you can record the number of successful attempts at identifying weather-appropriate clothing over a certain number of sessions, and compare that with the number threshold necessary to meet the target. Alternatively, you can record what percentage of times your child can identify weather-appropriate clothing, and compare that with the percentage threshold necessary to meet the target.