Post on March 29, 2017 by Kevin Robson

‘Little Happy Helper’ – A New Supermarket Initiative at ASDA, Southbank, Middlesbrough.

A few weeks ago one of our parents, Jenny Barnett contacted us with an idea to support families with Autism and other needs during supermarket visits. Jenny is an employee at ASDA in Southbank and also has a good personal understanding of autism and the difficulties it can cause in everyday situations. We initially supported by providing information on the visuals that are used by the children in school. We also suggested other strategies that may help to support in a supermarket environment. It can be very difficult for children with Autism to cope with noise, lighting, crowds and over stimulation of goods. Jenny put a large amount of time and effort into creating the resources and setting up an initial trial. On Tuesday 21st March 2017 Rainbow Class were invited to go to ASDA supermarket at Southbank. We were given one of the visual shopping lists to trial and the children helped to find the items using the symbols we use at school. Whilst doing our shopping, photographs were taken that will be used by this ASDA store to help promote the initiative.

We would like to thank Jenny and Tanya Barry the in store Community Champion who welcomed us into the supermarket and made our shopping experience a very positive one.

Information about the ‘Little Happy Helper’ is on the ‘Proud to Champion our Community’ board and provides details on how to access the visual shopping list from the Customer Service desk. We will continue to work with ASDA in the coming months and keep you informed as this initiative is further developed.