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Being on the Spectrum

• What a scary thought. You are told that either you or your child is on the spectrum. When I first started
• teaching and a parent said their child was on the spectrum, I looked at them with concern. My first
• question was “Do you know what that means? After listening to the parent, I began to understand their
• concerns and fears. They do their research but still feel at a loss. The material is very technical and it
• doesn’t answer their question. How do we help our child? Unfortunately, most educators do not have
• the answer to that question
• The spectrum goes from minimal to severe problems in daily life. From low cognitive ability
• (retardation-a term o longer used) to not being able to interact well with others. In the long ago past we
• might have said, “My son is very shy, he is a loner”. It doesn’t matter which end of the spectrum the
• individual is on. They are all scary to a parent.
• Being on the spectrum affects the nervous system. It impacts speech and social communication.
• Unfortunately, there is no known cause. Studies are being conducted to determine how the
• environment impacts the dysfunction of auditory processing. Being unable to communicate
• appropriately is the reason they do not appear to fit in with their peers.
• Auditory processing is a disorder that is often not understood. It is commonly believed that you don’t
• hear what is being said. Most autistic children and hear fine. It just comes through in a jumble. Some
• believe that here is a connection between auditory processing and language development.
• Autism Speaks, a controversial national organization, funded a grant recently to study how the central
• nervous system (auditory processing) impacts the ability to acquire language. Timothy Roberts, PhD is
• researching the idea that certain sounds in spoken words are a distraction, similar to sound in the
• environment that inhibits the child from putting it together to make and hear complete words.
• In my future blogs I will go into things we can do to help the high functioning child fit in. As of now
• there is little we can do make the low functioning individual into an average functioning individual. But
• we can train them so they can be a more independent functioning person.
• For more information on Austin speaks contact http://www.AustismSpeaks.org 
• I am available for comments and questions.
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