LEGO® as a Communicative Therapy

It “is widely accepted that social competence correlates with later life outcomes in mental well-being, education, employment, crime and substance misuse” according to Evans and Bond (2021). Methods such as LEGO® based therapy (LBT) can allow for the development of social skills and communicative competence which benefit individuals throughout the rest of their lives. LBT, a group-based targeted intervention, has been commonly used among children and young adults in need of extra support with social skills through utilizing the collaborative building of LEGO® models (Evans & Bond, 2021).

This involves participants adopting roles of engineer, parts supplier, or builder, all of whom must work together in the construction of a model and in turn building skills crucial to communication such as turn-taking, giving clear and understandable instructions, as well as asking for clarification and help when needed. This method has shown mixed results due to variance in implementation yet overall has resulted in common notice of improved social interaction and competence by teachers and extensive support from parents (Barr et al., 2022).

I believe this to be an evidently important notion for all parents teachers of children with slower communicative development to consider, and I highly recommend checking out the two articles referenced in this:

Evans, V., & Bond, C. (2021). The implementation of LEGO® ‐Based Therapy in two English mainstream primary schools. Journal of Research in Special Educational Needs, 21(2). https://doi.org/10.1111/1471-3802.12504

Barr, A., Coates, E., Kingsley, E., Cuesta, G. G., Biggs, K., Le Couteur, A., & Wright, B. (2022). A mixed methods evaluation of the acceptability of therapy using LEGO® bricks ( LEGO® based therapy) in mainstream primary and secondary education. Autism Research, 15(7). https://doi.org/10.1002/aur.2725