Make a choice
Being allowed to choose sounds like a gift, but it quickly becomes a burden when the range is wide and the decision feels impossible to undo. The pictures below make the options fewer and visible, so the decision shrinks to something a child can actually make.
♀Person choosing between an apple and a banana
A person holds a red apple in one hand and a banana in the other, with two arrows pointing towards their head.
♀Child between two option cards
A smiling child stands between an orange card showing an apple and a blue card showing a t-shirt, reaching towards the orange card.
♀Child pointing at three option bubbles
A smiling child with long hair points at three speech bubbles showing an apple, a car and a yellow t-shirt.
♀Child with arms out between an apple and a star
A laughing child stands with arms outstretched between a red apple and a blue star.
♀Choose between two things
A person holds an apple in one hand and a toy car in the other, with a question mark above.
About this visual support
An open choice contains more work than it looks like. The child has to survey what exists, guess how each option will feel, compare them against each other and then live with the result. The last part weighs the most: many children get stuck not on choosing but on the fear of choosing wrong and missing the other thing.
Visual support helps by making the range finite. Three pictures on the table form a question with three answers, while a room full of possibilities is a question without edges. The pictures also keep the choice visible afterwards, which makes it easier to stick with when doubt arrives a minute later.
A concrete tip is to say how long the choice applies: until snack time, not for the whole afternoon. Once a decision has an end date, making it becomes less dangerous. In Routined the moment of choosing can sit as a step of its own with a few pictures to point at, and the app can be tried for fourteen days at no cost.
Use this image in a schedule
Build your own visual schedule with this image and download it as a print-ready PDF. Completely free.
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Take the visual supports with you
In Routined you build schedules from these pictures, add timers and voice instructions, and your child follows the day on their own.
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