Advantage Autism

Finding an activity or sport for children or adults with ASD isn’t easy, however when you do find the ‘sport or activity’ that works, the benefits far outweigh the journey to find the sport or activity.

“People with a disability receive the same physical, mental and social benefits from participating in sport and physical activity as those not having a disability.”

Team sports can be overwhelming, and many parents have found that, for their child or young adult, tennis can provide the environment that suits them better.

Advantage Autism – the award-winning Au-Tastic Tennis Program:

Tennis is an Individual Sport

This means your child or young adult will be responsible for every move they make. Since there is no team to depend on, their success is their own. The feeling of accomplishment that comes with being solely responsible for progress in sports can quickly build confidence and self-esteem.

Sessions take place on single enclosed courts, to avoid the constant arrival and departure of traffic to the club, and avoid over-stimulation or loss of focus. All courts can be locked so participants are secure. Parents, support workers, or carers are welcome on court at all times to assist or provide encouragement.

Mental Development

Tennis is 90% mental. Think of a tennis court as a big chess board (that can be scaled to a smaller chess board as needed). Again there’s no team to lean on, so your child or young adult gets the opportunity to work independently to figure everything out.

The opportunities to build these basic independent strategic-thinking skills on the tennis court can often accelerate a child’s ability to problem-solve. As a result, many children who play tennis, even in its most rudimentary form, show accelerated growth in the frontal lobe of their brain – the section of the brain associated with reasoning, planning, and problem-solving. In other words, tennis is good for your child’s mental development both on and off the tennis court.

Physical Development

The most obvious benefit of tennis is physical development, but this isn’t exclusive to the physical shape of one’s body. Tennis is one of the few sports that involves a lot of “moving parts,” allowing a child or young adult to fine-tune their basic motor skills.

One of the most important basic motor skills is hand-eye coordination, which is the way one’s eyes process information to direct the movement of the hands. Hand-eye coordination starts developing in infancy and is needed for everyday tasks like getting dressed, eating, handwriting, and tying shoes.

In tennis, players must keep their eye on the ball at all times so their hands can quickly react. This type of focus can aid in the development and progression of a child’s hand-eye coordination that can translate outside of tennis.

One-On-One Learning (Private Lessons)

The spectrum is broad. Each situation is unique and one of the biggest benefits of tennis is that one-on-one instruction is common and can be easily tailored to meet a child’s specific needs.

It goes without saying that not every child is ready to hop out onto the tennis court and rally with a buddy. Private or semi-private instruction can be customised and still provide all the developmental benefits tennis has to offer.

How Do I Get Started?

For parents looking to get their child or young adult started with tennis, lessons are the first step. We understand how hard it is to find recreational opportunities for children and adults on the spectrum and know full well the benefits of making the sport available to them.

Simply contact us to discuss your child or young adult’s needs, and to arrange a free trial session.

Anxiety?

Many players do experience extreme anxiety visiting a new location, trying a new activity, meeting new people, so we have a “look, watch, feel safe, elect to join” process.

The player is welcome to watch as many sessions as they like. This assists the player in feeling safe; once a player feels safe, the player has the control to elect to join in. This process has been beyond successful, as there is no pressure to commit, a player has the time to adjust to a new environment and the feeling of being overwhelmed. As the player sits in the new environment, such feelings decrease, and the player gains confidence in the new environment, and the natural progression is to take part.

We have had players come and watch for 5 minutes and then join in, and others watch for one session or a few sessions – there are no restrictions, and if anything at all, we have created a pathway for people with ASD to access their local community.

NDIS Funding:

NDIS does cover tennis lessons, tennis competitions, and tennis club membership. Our programs are valid for NDIS funding for players who are plan-managed or self-managed only.

Sport and recreation fit into these four NDIS funding categories:

• Social and community participation
• Health and wellbeing
• Relationships
• Choice and control
• Please view the NDIS sports guide via this link for assistance: https://dsr.org.au/ndis-sports-guide/

NDIS Documentation Preparation:

Slamin provides a tailored “scheduled structure of support” documentation, as well as assessment planning, and goal planning, in preparation for a student’s NDIS planning sessions.

We do kindly request ample time (minimum 2 weeks) for requests, due to the amount of preparation work that goes into these detailed documents. These reports and documents do incur a charge dependent on the needs and time required to prepare.

Parent / Guardian / Carer feedback:

“Our son, Sahil, is a 23-year-old non-verbal young man with autism. He is physically strong and loves the outdoors, but needs to be pushed and supervised when it comes to organised activity. There are not too many options for organised sporting activities for my son, so when we heard about Advantage Autism – The Au-tastic tennis program, we thought we would give it a go and see if Sahil could benefit from it. After the very first session, we were surprised by how quickly Sahil took to hitting balls over the net and listening to the instructor. Importantly, he appeared to like the activity and was getting a sense of achievement at the same time. Sahil has been in the program only a few weeks now, but clearly there is a lot of potential for him to improve his technique, get exercise, and better his mental wellbeing. We just wish we had discovered the program earlier.” – Priya and Anoop

“Last year my daughter Ellysha had the opportunity to work with a coach from Slamin Tennis at Bulleen Heights Primary, a school for children with ASD.

Ellysha the following year started secondary school at Bulleen Heights Autism Spectrum Disorder School and as such we transitioned her Advantage Autism tennis to Doncaster Tennis Club on a Saturday afternoon. If she misses a lesson she is devastated. This passion for the sport was fostered and developed thanks to Slamin Tennis and Fitness, and Vicky’s unique program Advantage Autism.

Socially her development has been breathtaking. The opportunity to interact with other children having lessons has introduced her to a whole new social network. One which she has taken on board and consequently has forged new friendships. Emotionally her passion for tennis grows with each passing day.

Physically the sport has developed her core strength, fitness, and stamina. These things she has been lacking for a long time, and those that needed addressing.

As a family, we are just so grateful for what tennis has done for Ellysha. Tennis is now Ellysha’s sporting passion for life, and she is actually becoming a very competent tennis player. In the past few months, her skills have come on in leaps and bounds. We are astounded just how good she has become which has given her a level of confidence never seen before.

Without Slamin Tennis and their magnificent Advantage Autism school program, Ellysha would not have the passion for tennis today.

We cannot recommend more highly what Slamin Tennis offers to children and young adults with Autism and the results are right in front of us in the form of our daughter Ellysha. – Tony