If you’ve read this blog for any length of time, you know how much I like to make skills truly functional. So, when I set about to make independent work tasks for older students, it got me thinking about ways our students can work on basic skills in independent work but still have them relate to real life.
The key to age-appropriate tasks, even when we are teaching basic skills like color matching, is to think about how they are used in the real world.
Most of these ideas are tasks you can make with real materials as well as with the tasks pictured.
Students working on vocational skills are going to need to sort or match materials to shelves, tables, etc. One thing they need to match to restock is clothing.
Matching Pants on a Sales Table
For instance, they need to fold clothes and put them back on the tables, much like the pants in this task.
Matching Shirts in the Closet
They also need to match clothes to put back on racks after people try them on. In a classroom, you could have them hang clothes that match on the same rod much like this set.
Stocking Shelves with Soda
And they could also stock shelves with matching soda cans. Often soda cans can be differentiated by color as much as the words on the labels. In this file folder, students match the sodas.
Matching Clothes to Wear
Students have to match clothes to wear as well. One instance would be for sports uniforms where the shirts have to match the hats, like in the task below.
Matching Shoes
They also have to match their shoes when they put them on…and usually when they put them away as well. Use a shoe cubby with shoes to have them practice and they can practice with this set of tasks as well. You can grab this file free in my store.
Matching Socks
Whether they are hanging on a line, like in the file folder, or just matching socks to put them on, everyone has to match their socks.
Matching Keys to Locks
Typically you would match the pattern of the key to the lock, but often we color code the keys with stickers to make it easy to remember what they fit.
Each of these tasks are available individually (as preferred by our Facebook Group) and as a discounted set together. And, as you can see, the shoe file folder is FREE!
![Independent Work-3 Ways It can Become Your Best Classroom Management Tool [A sorting task in a shoebox to sort nouns from verbs on popsicle sticks into plastic cups]](https://autismclassroomresources.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/BLOG-22208-3-Ways-Task-Boxes-and-IW-Help-Classroom-Management-2-768x644.jpg)
