Autism and Shoe Tying: A Special Education Teacher's Complete Guide for Parents

By Bobby Morong | Special Education & Adapted PE Teacher | Inventor of Training Ties

In over 20 years of working with children on the autism spectrum — in classrooms, gyms, therapy rooms, and living rooms — I've watched hundreds of kids struggle with shoe tying. And I've watched the adults around them eventually give up.

I get it. When your child melts down every time laces come out, when the OT sessions haven't moved the needle, when your kid's classmates are tying their own shoes and yours is still in Velcro — it's tempting to just accept that shoe tying isn't going to happen.

But here's what I've learned after two decades: it's not that kids with autism can't tie their shoes. It's that the way we've been teaching them is fundamentally broken.

Why Traditional Shoe Tying Methods Fail Kids With Autism

Think about what traditional shoe tying instruction requires. A parent or teacher sits across from a child and says something like: "Take the right lace, cross it over the left, pull it underneath, now make a loop with your right hand..."

For a child with autism, this instruction is a minefield:

Directional language confusion. "Left over right" is already abstract for neurotypical kids. For a child with autism spectrum disorder, who may process spatial language differently, it's often meaningless. Mirror-image demonstration makes it worse — your "right" is their "left."

Motor planning overload. Shoe tying requires 8-12 sequential fine motor steps. Many children with ASD have co-occurring dyspraxia or motor planning difficulties. Holding a multi-step sequence in working memory while executing unfamiliar bilateral hand movements is like asking someone to juggle while solving algebra.

Sensory challenges. Laces are thin, slippery, and require precise finger pressure. For kids with tactile sensory processing differences, the physical sensation of manipulating laces can be genuinely uncomfortable — or the sensory input may not register clearly enough for them to know if they're gripping correctly.

No tolerance for failure. Here's the big one. In traditional shoe tying, if you lose tension at any point during the process, everything unravels. You start from scratch. For a child who already has difficulty with frustration tolerance and emotional regulation, this repeated failure cycle is devastating. It's not just a motor task anymore — it becomes an emotional one.

What Actually Works: Breaking the Failure Cycle

After years of watching this cycle play out, I realized the problem wasn't the kids. It was the method. We needed a way to eliminate the penalty for partial mistakes — to let a child succeed at step 3 without losing steps 1 and 2 when they struggled.

That's why I created Training Ties. They use patented checkpoint technology — small waterproof vegan leather checkpoints that lock laces at critical failure points during the tying process. Think of them like save points in a video game. If your child completes the first cross-over but struggles with the loop, the checkpoint holds the cross-over in place. They never have to start over.

The result? 93% of children succeed in their first session, most within 10-15 minutes. That includes children with autism, ADHD, Down syndrome, dyspraxia, and cerebral palsy.

If you want the shortest path to a calmer setup, start with our autism, ADHD & fine motor support guide. If sensory load is the biggest barrier in your house, pair it with our sensory-friendly shoe tying guide so the teaching environment works with your child instead of against them.

A Step-by-Step Approach for Parents of Children With Autism

Whether or not you use Training Ties, here are the strategies I've developed specifically for teaching shoe tying to children with autism:

1. Start off the foot. Remove the shoe from the foot entirely. Place it on a table at chest height. This eliminates the balance challenge, the awkward angle, and the proprioceptive confusion of reaching down while sitting. It also gives your child a clear, uncluttered visual field.

2. Use a video tutorial, not live demonstration. Videos can be paused, replayed, and watched from the learner's exact perspective. Live demonstration introduces mirror-image confusion and social pressure. Every pair of Training Ties comes with a QR code linking to our step-by-step video tutorial for exactly this reason.

3. Use the "I Do, We Do, You Do" method. First, you slowly demonstrate the full process while your child watches silently. Then, you do it together — your child attempts each step with help from you only when asked. Finally, your child tries independently while you simply watch. This gradual release of responsibility is a cornerstone of special education pedagogy.

4. Eliminate verbal instruction during attempts. This is counterintuitive for most parents, but it's critical. When your child is attempting to tie, stay silent. Don't narrate. Don't correct. Don't encourage. Verbal input during a complex motor sequence can be overwhelming for children with autism who are already managing heavy cognitive load. Let the visual model (video) and the tactile feedback do the teaching.

5. Two-color laces help immensely. Using two different colored laces (one per side) eliminates the need for directional language entirely. Instead of "take the right lace," you can reference "the blue one." This is an evidence-based strategy used by occupational therapists nationwide.

6. Choose the right time. Don't attempt shoe tying when your child is already dysregulated, hungry, tired, or in transition. Pick a calm, low-demand time when your child has energy and emotional bandwidth. Saturday morning after breakfast, not Wednesday after school.

When Should You Start?

The typical developmental window for shoe tying readiness is ages 5-7 for neurotypical children. For children with autism, I generally see readiness between ages 6-10, but this varies enormously based on individual motor development, cognitive profile, and sensory processing.

Signs your child may be ready:

They can cross midline (reach their right hand to their left side and vice versa). They can follow a 3-4 step visual sequence. They can manipulate small objects with both hands simultaneously. And critically — they have expressed interest in tying their own shoes, or frustration at not being able to.

Readiness matters more than age. Pushing shoe tying before a child is developmentally ready creates negative associations that make future attempts harder. If your child isn't ready, there's no shame in waiting.

Why This Skill Matters More Than You Think

Some parents ask me: "Why bother? Velcro and slip-ons exist." And they're right — workarounds exist. But shoe tying isn't just about shoes.

It's a bilateral coordination milestone that builds neural pathways used in dozens of other life skills: buttoning shirts, using utensils, handwriting, opening containers, using tools. It's also one of the first true independence skills a child masters — a tangible moment where they prove to themselves that they can do something hard.

For children with autism, who hear "let me help you" a hundred times a day, that moment of independence is profound. I've seen nonverbal kids light up. I've seen teenagers cry. I've watched parents record the moment on their phones because they never thought it would happen.

It happens. And when you remove the broken methodology and give kids the right tools, it happens faster than you'd believe.

More autism-specific resources

We built a dedicated page that walks through who the checkpoint method is built for and how to start: Shoe-Tying Help for Autism, ADHD & Fine Motor Support. It pairs with everything above.

Bobby Morong is a special education and adapted PE teacher with over 20 years of experience and the inventor of Training Ties, the patented shoe tying tool with a 93% first-session success rate. Shop Training Ties — $25.

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