Socialization for children:
an example of picture-mapping

No! It’s Mine! A Play-Date

Two four year olds, Sophie and Andrew, were on a play-date in Sophie’s playroom at home. Their mothers were with them in the playroom. Andrew honed in on and became very excited to play with a small tricycle in Sophie’s house. The kids got off to a good start, but as both mothers watched, Sophie saw how much fun Andrew was having pedaling on the bike. She became disinterested in her toys, and ran to Andrew, yelled that she wanted her bike back, and started to grab at the handlebars on the bike. Andrew put his head down fast, and quickly bit hard into Sophie’s hand that was on the handlebar. He almost broke the skin, it hurt, and Sophie began screaming. You could see the teeth marks, and both moms were upset. They didn’t know whom to yell at first, because it was not fair to Andrew that Sophie didn’t share and that she yelled and grabbed at him. However, both moms agreed that it was worse that Andrew bit Sophie as he could have really hurt her had he broken the skin—he was close!

So this is what happened:

Andrew’s mother, Anne, who had been trained by us to use the Picture-Mapping technique, told Sophie’s mother she was going to handle this.

• She did not yell at the children, but she sat the kids on the floor, and put a storyboard paper in front of them.
• Anne quickly took out a pen and paper and drew nine squares.
• The kids sat down, surprised by no talking (and no yelling at them), just this action of sitting down and seeing Anne drawing.
• Anne took nine small boxes the same size, and in each box, put the following:
  1. In the first box, she drew two children, a boy and a girl, playing nicely together. She put an A on the boy and an S on the girl.
  2. She showed the girl pulling on the handlebar of the boy’s bike.
  3. She showed the boy biting the girl’s arm.
  4. She showed the girl crying!
  5. NO biting by using a red X! (The children were directed to put the red X’s on the map.)
  6. NO hitting by using a red X!
  7. No kicking by using a red X!
  8. No pushing by using a red X!
  9. She showed the boy with a word bubble saying, “Use your words,” and told both Andrew and Sophie that they could say, “Can I have a turn?” or “Can I ride, too?” or “Do you want to switch?”

Then, Anne said, “Here is our play-date rule: this is what you are allowed to do—you are allowed to use your words if you want a toy your friend has. This is what you are NOT allowed to do: no biting, no hitting, no kicking and no pushing.” She had the kids repeat the rules for what they were allowed to do and what they were not allowed to do. If each child did not say it right, she went back and started again.

She touched each of the boxes as the child repeated what to do, what not to do.

Follow Up

The kids had an uneventful, fun and cooperative play date. Anne called to tell us the story, and she and Sophie’s mother were not only happy with the result, but really surprised that it worked after only one 6- or 7-minute interruption of play! She decided to make a copy of the Picture Map for Sophie’s mom, and both moms decided to repeat the mapping technique with the kids before their next play-date the following week

as support social reminders. There were no more “hurting” each other incidents and that next play date ran much smoother without fighting! The kids seemed to share better, too. Therefore, Anne made sure the kids got a picture map reminder at the beginning of each of their play times that she said definitely made a huge difference!

Why use a Picture Map in this situation?

We know that children learn from visual imagery, and the visual cortex has more brain cells than the auditory cortex. Research shows that a small child more easily remembers a graphic image than a verbal command. Take a highly charged emotional situation, and the use of storytelling through symbols helps to develop sensory and cognitive awareness.

Visual processing of mental images is strengthened in the right side of the brain, which is known to be the mediator of emotionality. The right side of the brain is also responsible for form discrimination and pattern recognition. This is why visual or picture mapping—seeing the form of a shape and learning its meaning—is an effective learning tool.

Sophie and Andrew were too upset at the time of the “incident” to even listen to their mom’s voices. They were both beginning to melt down and lose it…the key is to intervene quickly with an effective shift.

The kids were surprised by the insertion of a picture-mapping story, an unusual intervention, and this unexpected activity initially quieted them down. You know how resilient kids are, and how they can be re-organized given a reason to do so. Think of a child’s tears drying up real fast if you offer them something else they like, or show them a new thing. Children learn more quickly and better with the visual sequencing: the X’s made it very clear to them what was bad behavior (NO!) and not permitted. This presented the boundaries for their behaviors. Ultimately, this became a more generalized lesson for each of the children individually when playing
well with others.