The site I visited was a preschool setting with kids with autism aged between 4 - 9 years. According to Wolfberg (2015), autism is a growth disorder that interferes with the children's ability to communicate and to interact effectively with people. It inhibits the healthy development of the brain hence affecting communication and interaction. The disorder, as affirmed by Wolfberg (2015), not only interferes with how people perceive sensory information but also how the brain processes it. Research shows that autism does not have any apparent biological reason, unlike some other developmental disorders such as blindness, mental retardation, deafness, and so on.
According to Case-Smith, Weaver & Fristad (2015), autism is characterized by communication impairment, self-destructive, aggressive behaviors, and low social functioning. In addition to language problems among such children, there may exist troublesome symptoms such as incongruous public behavior, bad temper, and self-destructive behaviors (Case-Smith, Weaver & Fristad, 2015). Children with autism also develop weaker ties with their peers or do not develop them at all. Instead, they prefer spending their time to observe and imitate everything they see around. These children do not share their thoughts and feelings with others and cannot communicate their needs openly and effectively (Wolfberg, 2015),
At the time of my visit, the kids were in the classroom setting for the disabled. Wolfberg (2015) asserts that children and teenagers with autism should be placed in special education programs for disabled people because a regular classroom environment can be detrimental to their condition. In the course of my investigation, I noticed that most of the kids could talk, name things around them, count or say the alphabet, and recite the word of a whole book for word from memory. They, however, had difficulties in speech communication. They could not speak naturally without the use of gestures. They could produce some funny sounds to signify what they want to say. According to Wolfberg (2015), such impairments eventually result in things like lack of social interaction where the child likes to be isolated rather than being in the presence of others because they cannot easily comprehend the nature of making and living with friends. I also noticed that some kids, instead of attending classes, could spend most of their time in the field, arranging all the cut grass into neat, straight lines. According to Wolfberg (2015), this obsessive and repetitive behavior of doing the same all the time is referred to as stereotyped behaviors. Some kids also had a habit of disagreeing with other people's ideas and lacked correct measures of explaining themselves. Besides, other children were not able to think of what they were saying as they were having problems comprehending the nature of the language, such as cracking jokes as well as using metaphors. Pickles et al. (2016) state that these same children have challenges in imagination, which makes them have some disprovable resistance to any change in their social life.
According to Pickles et al. (2016), children with autism requires a lot of care and attention. Although autism has no cure, the objective of treatment and therapies is to lessen the symptoms of the disease. The services that I offered included physical therapy, speech therapy, training of social skills, coaching, and behavior modification. Behavioral modification, according to Pickles et al. (2016), aims to improve specific appropriate behaviors or to lessen inappropriate behavior. This approach is commonly considered to be the most effective in treating autism in children. .After some physiotherapy, some students were able to improve their communication skills, overcome anxiety and depression, and learn how to interact effectively with other people. Some students were also able to control their involuntary body movements, such as repetitive hand gestures.
With the provision of individual learning support, children with autism will not only improve the ability to develop their independence but also enhance their academic learning experiences as well as the ability to mingle and communicate with other children who do not have autism (Wolfberg, 2015). Tools like goal setting, role modeling, coaching, and repetition of movement much helped these children to adapt to the learning environment and improve their skills. According to Wolfberg (2015), early intervention practices are useful measures for enhancing the learning skills of children with mental disorders. He further argues that autism children who receive early intervention programs tend to perform better in schools, improve communication skills, and overall social skills.
Overall, I can say that my interaction with children with autism was overwhelming. It is important to note that a complete cure for autism may be impossible since medical experts have not fully understood this disorder. However, the patient's life can be improved. Research reveals that with proper care and treatment, many individuals with autism can continue living healthy lives as the chances of treatment depend on the manifestation and type of autism (Pickles et al. (2016). For the interns working with children with autism, I would advise them to offer their support to these children fully. They can help them develop their necessary abilities by providing them the stimulation activities. They can also help them to manage their lives, improve social interactions, and understand various social cues that determine the effectiveness of communication.
Wolfberg, P. J. (2015). Play and imagination in children with autism. Teachers College Press. https://www.amazon.com/Imagination-Children-Autism-Pamela-Wolfberg/dp/0807749419
Case-Smith, J., Weaver, L. L., & Fristad, M. A. (2015). A systematic review of sensory processing interventions for children with autism spectrum disorders. Autism, 19(2), 133-148. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24477447
Pickles, A., Le Couteur, A., Leadbitter, K., Salomone, E., Cole-Fletcher, R., Tobin, H.,. & Aldred, C. (2016). Parent-mediated social communication therapy for young children with autism (PACT): long-term follow-up of a randomized controlled trial. The Lancet, 388(10059), 2501-2509. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27793431
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