By Mommy | July 22, 2008 - 7:33 pm
Our boy has been in his integrated kindergarten classroom for about two weeks now, with half his day spent in special ed. During that time, he’s learned the proper way to cut with scissors and he’s holding his pencil almost the right way too.
Up to this point, he’s used scissors in the most bass-ackward, sideways, upside-down, shoulder-touching-the-chin method - it’s almost been comical to watch! His teacher took a marker and drew a dot on his hand in the fleshy part between his thumb and pointer finger. She encouraged him to make the dot face the ceiling while he was cutting. Yep. That simple.
He can write his name along with several other letters, but he holds his pencil like a maniac holds a knife. His teacher placed a quarter in his hand, having him pinch it between his palm and his pinky and ring finger. This frees up the other three fingers for holding a pencil almost the right way! She called it a “paintbrush grasp.” Hey, it’s a start.
Every time I hear about some simple, ingenious habit, it makes me feel so impressed and awestruck by her experience with these kids. And, it makes me feel kind of like a moron. Such simple things! Yet, I never would have come up with them on my own in a bazillion years. Go, teacher.
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By Mommy | July 18, 2008 - 8:02 am
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By Mommy | July 18, 2008 - 7:58 am
I don’t listen to talk radio at all, so I’d never heard of Michael Savage until this morning. But, he’s got my attention now! On his radio program, he called autism, the “illness du jour” and said autism was a fraud and a racket.
“I’ll tell you what autism is. In 99 percent of the cases, it’s a brat who hasn’t been told to cut the act out. That’s what autism is. What do you mean they scream and they’re silent? They don’t have a father around to tell them, ‘Don’t act like a moron. You’ll get nowhere in life. Stop acting like a putz. Straighten up. Act like a man. Don’t sit there crying and screaming, idiot.’ ” Savage concluded, “[I]f I behaved like a fool, my father called me a fool. And he said to me, ‘Don’t behave like a fool.’ The worst thing he said — ‘Don’t behave like a fool. Don’t be anybody’s dummy. Don’t sound like an idiot.
Huh. Too bad he didn’t follow his father’s advice.
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By Mommy | July 14, 2008 - 12:45 pm
I know some of my readership includes parents of twins who are on the autism spectrum - those of you who fall into this category, please consider completing a confidential NOMOTC survey about Autism Spectrum Disorders in Multiples.
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By Mommy | July 13, 2008 - 10:26 am
And now we’re finding out why! This article in The Denver Post details a Harvard study in which researchers found half a dozen new genes involved in autism, suggesting that autism occurs because the brain is unable to form new connections. This is why some autistic children respond so well to early intervention - their brains can be repaired, so to speak - the genes aren’t missing, but they haven’t yet been switched on.
“The circuits are there but you have to give it an extra push,” said Dr. Gary Goldstein of the Kennedy Krieger Institute in Baltimore, which wasn’t involved in the gene hunt but is well-known for its autism behavioral therapy.
The genetics suggest that “what we’re doing makes sense when we work with these little kids — and work and work and work — and suddenly get through,” he said.
The article went on to say that because autism is such a broad disorder and so unique to every individual, genetic testing for autism may not ever be a reality. Each individual seems to have a custom, specific set of gene defects.
Isn’t it exciting, though, to see scientific confirmation that what we’re doing for our children may actually be working?
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