Comments on: FC, DIR, ABA, ASD: Cover story in Time magazine

By: Autism Vox » The [autistic] Child is father of the [autistic] Man

Autism Vox » The [autistic] Child is father of the [autistic] Man — Thu, 06 Jul 2006 04:38:51 +0000

[...] Indeed, autism mothers I know have said they don’t want to read writing about or by autistic adults because they find it “depressing” to think of when their children will be that age. In Autismland, I’m afraid we pay too much attention to children of a very young age. Charlie, as I have written on Autismland, has already (when he was at the ripe old age of eight) been the victim of age discrimination. Charlie learns best in certain highly-structured school settings that use a methodology called ABA (applied behavior analysis) and there are some schools (all very small) in New Jersey that specialize in this sort of autism education. We were not able to get three-year-old Charlie into one of these schools as we were living then in the Midwest and—-despite ample proof that Charlie thrives in an ABA setting—we have too often been told that “only three-year-olds” or “only children under the age of five” would be accepted. [...]

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leacvrjdu knbq — Wed, 05 Jul 2006 11:45:11 +0000

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By: Autism Vox » Time magazine report tries her hand at FC

Autism Vox » Time magazine report tries her hand at FC — Thu, 11 May 2006 17:37:51 +0000

[...] Claudia Wallis, who wrote the Time magazine article about two New Jersey autism schools, has written an article about Facilitated Communication (FC), “Helping” Autistic People to Speak in which she helps to hold an autistic man’s wrist as he types. I held Thresher’s wrist as he typed answers to my questions. I found that I had to constantly pull his hand back away from the keyboard with a steady pressure. At no point did I feel that I was leading him toward the keys, nor did I know the answers to the questions I was asking him. He answered some clearly, and others less coherently. [...]

By: Kristina Chew, PhD

Kristina Chew, PhD — Tue, 09 May 2006 01:04:34 +0000

We have, and have used all parts, of the autism therapy manuals that Maurice was a co-editor for. One of our best SLP’s had a Lovaas background and it was she who talk Charlie to talk. Our ABA team also figured out that using kinetic prompts helped him to learn language.

Lovely to hear about Ben. We often say, Charlie and college is a fine question mark—my husband and I spend out days with college students, and he need not join those ranks, unless that seems the rightful course.

By: rose

rose — Mon, 08 May 2006 19:39:17 +0000

I appreciate your gentle insistence on ABA. Maybe one reason Charlie has such success with it is because of the Pictorial/kinesthetic “show me” language based learning that is a part of it. When Ben was 4 I got Catherine Maurices book on “behavioral intervention” but used ONLY the language part, not the behavioral part.

Ben is smart, shy, and a good kid all around. Although he’s still in ’special ed’ part time…more as a haven than a punishment…I don’t doubt he could go to college and make it if it was an area that interested him.

Until the day I die, I will wonder if “showing” him how to talk made any difference! His speech teacher thought I was crazy to work an hour of two a day with him for a year…but I was one of those who had to do something!

Good luck with your little honey!

Rose