week 2 discussion 2 RESPONSE a.s.

For your peer response, choose one of your peer who wrote about the same disability you did. When responding to your peer share at least one thing that you think will be challenging about working with children with this disability. In addition, provide an additional resource that was not shared in one of the articles that focuses on this disability and explain how you feel this resource would help you to overcome the challenges. 150 words.

I am really unsure of the career path I plan to take once I am finished school. I worked with children for 12 years and have worked in the medical field now for 7 years. I go back and forth as to what I want to do. I love working with children and will eventually go back to that I believe.

I chose Autism. I worked with a child who had autism when I was teaching and really didn?t know much about it. I would love to learn more and be able to help children with this disorder.

It is my opinion one of the best ways educate someone on a topic is immersion….spending time with a family affected by autism. Teachers need to understand what autism looks like in the classroom but also what it looks like in the home. Teachers need to understand where the parent is coming from in order to communicate effectively. If a teacher has no specific coursework or experience working with families affected by autism, there is going to be huge learning curve as they start teaching in an Autism Support Classroom. An autism support teacher should have an “autism toolbox of learning” so to speak. If a child has severe behavior, then the teacher can pull out his/her tools about behavior, FBAs, sensory integration, positive behavior support plans, etc. If a child needs to work on social skills, the teacher can pull out his/her tools about teaching social skills, writing social stories or teaching theory of mind, etc.

Some things that I can do as a teacher will be: Comic Strip Conversations assist children with autism to develop greater social understanding, by providing visual representations of the different levels of communication that take place in a conversation, using symbols, stick figure drawings and colour. By seeing the different elements of a conversation visually presented, some of the abstract aspects of social communication (e.g. recognizing the feelings and intentions of others) are made more concrete and are therefore easier for the child to understand. Some children with autism respond well to drama and role play activities to help them learn social skills such as greetings, turn taking in conversation and watching for cues in social skills groups. A Circle of Friends or buddy system can also help a child with autism understand the social world of the classroom and the playground. Many children with autism find it easier to understand the world about them through visual aids. Teachers may use a visual timetable showing times and simple drawings of the activities, so that the pupil knows exactly what they will be doing and when.

Stahmer AC, Collings NM, Palinkas LA. Early intervention practices for children with autism: descriptions from community providers. Focus Autism Other Dev Disabl. 2005;20(2):66?79.