Monthly Tactile Calendar
Submitted by Liamsmom on Jan 05, 2016

My son Liam is in first grade in a mainstream setting. He is deafblind. In his classroom, his peers do "calendar" time together in the morning. I wanted to Liam to be able to be included in this activity in a way that was meaningful and accessible to him. I created a monthly tactile calendar for him to use at school and I wanted it to be larger in size so that it had room for the object symbols and Braille I wanted to add. I know there is a great tactile calendar available "pre-made" (Classroom Calendar Kit APH) however, I wanted to be able to save all of the calendar "work" from month to month, so that Liam would be able to learn about and discuss past events, present events and also future. I "bound" the pages together to form a large calendar book.
Materials:
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Teacher desk calendar glued onto posterboard. I used Elmer's glue to add slightly raised line on the calendar grid.
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Calendar objectives and routine printed off for each month (lesson plan)
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Brailled title for each month. Days of the week labeled in braille.
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Tactile symbol to represent each month (e.g. Christmas tree for December, leaf for September, pumpkin for Halloween, etc..)
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Calendar squares for each day of the month to be glued on. The squares include a symbol and/or braille words for one special event that happens each day.
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Binding machine (most elementary schools have these in their supply room).
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Braille numbers to place on the "calendar squares"
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Box to organize the calendar pieces.
Procedure:


Examples of symbols used:
Gym day: Piece of a rubber ball
Music Day: Wooden dowel to represent the wooden mallet used on the xylophone in class
Library Day: piece of chipboard that is used on the pages of his library books.
Special day: We have a special star object for when special events happen (ex: A family friend brought him lunch, Firefighters came to speak to the class, etc.).
Comments
I always love reading your
Thanks for the tip!