All About Autism

[ImMeeMee]

Then again just went for a talk on early intervention from an overseas speaker who is an expert in this area and he shared that the foundational skills in ASD are joint attention and imitation.


I suppose these are not exactly life skills but learning different skills could be more effective if the child has these two foundational skills, because there could be a lot more incidental learning.

[Double E]

Yes, imitation skills are very impt. They need to observe and copy from others so that they can do things on their own.

[Karkar]

ImMeeMee:

Helplessmum


I don't know exactly what is the definition of life skills cos its a very broad term. But I can share with you the different areas that my daughter's EIPIC centre looks into as a reference:

1. Gross motor skills - eg. Ability to climb stairs independently, ability to maintain balance, jump, run and walk properly.
2. Fine motor skills - eg ability to work with small objects, ability to use fingers appropriately etc, leading to writing n desk work.
3. Cognitive development - the ABCs and 123s; reading, counting and the usual stuff that we have been discussing about in academics.
4. Adaptive skills - eg. Ability to self feed, toileting, dress/undress. Something like self-help skills.
5. Social knowledge - social awareness and ability to interact with peers.
6. Social communication - ability to communicate for one's needs, eg. Asking for help.

To a certain extent, all the above are life skills. There is no official priority on which comes first, and the focus depends on what are the gaps of the child.

my son is improving on no.4. no 5 and no 6 are the weakest. I wonder if mummies you all do anything at home to strengthen 5 and 6.

[Karkar]

ImMeeMee:

Then again just went for a talk on early intervention from an overseas speaker who is an expert in this area and he shared that the foundational skills in ASD are joint attention and imitation.


I suppose these are not exactly life skills but learning different skills could be more effective if the child has these two foundational skills, because there could be a lot more incidental learning.

totally agreed. that makes my son the case. joint attention and imitation. i need to work on it myself as well.

the psychologist will take 1 month to write up the report and plan a comprehensive plan. case manager said they would wait for her report. I wonder i have been in contact with them since mid Sep. another month means i wont get any intervention session rolling until mid nov? it's 2month delay. I know that my son is young, but 2 month delay seems too much. I wonder what i can do as i cant send him to another centre. i just started this one and paid the assessment and all. Sigh.....i also need to get trained to be able to apply at home.

[Blokus]

Kar kar


I recommend you pick up this book, "A Work in progress" by Ron leaf. It’s like a textbook for parents/therapist. It’s highlights to the guardian the areas to look out for I.e non verbal imitation, verbal imitation, joint attention, play, gross motor skills & many more. In each area, it also give specific instructions how to teach your child to pick up the specific skills. So like for non verbal imitation, it says to demonstrate an action by saying ‘do this’, later progress to naming the action (ie jumping). Start with large obvious actions then progress to subtle ones. Use physical guidance to move the child through the action. I guess this means you assist him with the action then gradually prompt with light touch, then gesture. Some of the actions listed are ring bell, stir spoon in bowl, tap table with block, shake tambourine etc. Once he’s good with at least 5 action you can move up to the 2nd phase of non verbal imitation which is large motor skills.

I like this book because it List down the different stages of each skill. I used to think once he’s got a skill he’s got it. But not true, some skills comes in different stages. So a child may have a certain stages of a skill set but not all. This book helps me to identify the stages my son has.

If you want, I can zap a few pages on imitation and joint attention so that you can work on it first while waiting for the report? Anyhow, you can start on the above example. Hope this helps somewhat.

[ImMeeMee]

Karkar:

totally agreed. that makes my son the case. joint attention and imitation. i need to work on it myself as well.


the psychologist will take 1 month to write up the report and plan a comprehensive plan. case manager said they would wait for her report. I wonder i have been in contact with them since mid Sep. another month means i wont get any intervention session rolling until mid nov? it's 2month delay. I know that my son is young, but 2 month delay seems too much. I wonder what i can do as i cant send him to another centre. i just started this one and paid the assessment and all. Sigh.....i also need to get trained to be able to apply at home.

kar kar

When my daughter first started her speech therapy at 3 yo, the ST did not jump straight into speech or language, but she started with joint attention through building more eye contact.

The therapists will usually look for things that interest the child, and use that as an exchange tool to get the child to have more eye contact - the child looks at you upon your request, he gets the item that he likes. Practise this a lot until it gets to him that he must have eye contact if he wants his favorite item. Actually this is a bit like ABA if I am not wrong.

Perhaps you may like to focus on eye contact as a first step in the interim while you await the program. I think its ok to do it the layman way, or the usual mother-teach-child way, without having to think too much into the professional methodology until your centre comes up with its professional advice. Potentially your centre may also start with that, but with the proper ABA methodology.

my two cents worth.

[ArielMermaid]

helplessmum3:

Hi Nuggets, thanks for your advise,

is your child already at epic?


any mummies here ,your child already in rainbow?

My son is and has been in Rainbow for more than 3 years. I really appreciate them and my son enjoys going to school as well. His teachers are very nice and will send me SMS/ pictures every now and then. Every week, they will update the communication booklet with the activities done and even pictures of him. Rainbow organises a lot of outings- to the zoo, Science Centre, theatres, etc.

However, I heard of some grouses from other parents that they feel that their children (with serious sensory issues) are being relegated to \"worse\" classes and are not treated fairly.

Hope the above helps

[Karkar]

Thanks Blokus and ImMeeMee.


I pmed you, Blokus.
don’t you think it’s tough to practise the theory? my son’s room is full of toys, hardly can find anything that can hold his interest for long. besides, i have inlaws who would always rescue him whenever he screams or needs help.

[mashy]

Karkar:

Thanks Blokus and ImMeeMee.


I pmed you, Blokus.
don't you think it's tough to practise the theory? my son's room is full of toys, hardly can find anything that can hold his interest for long. besides, i have inlaws who would always rescue him whenever he screams or needs help.

He doesn't like cars and trains? Most boys like these. Mine can play trains whole day long. He watched them go round and round. Think at 2, he was spinning container covers and tops to the point of obsession.

[mashy]

slmkhoo:

ImMeeMee:

The therapists will usually look for things that interest the child, and use that as an exchange tool to get the child to have more eye contact - the child looks at you upon your request, he gets the item that he likes. Practise this a lot until it gets to him that he must have eye contact if he wants his favorite item. Actually this is a bit like ABA if I am not wrong.


Perhaps you may like to focus on eye contact as a first step in the interim while you await the program. I think its ok to do it the layman way, or the usual mother-teach-child way, without having to think too much into the professional methodology until your centre comes up with its professional advice. Potentially your centre may also start with that, but with the proper ABA methodology.

my two cents worth.

For eye contact, do the therapists insist on trying for prolonged contact or fleeting contact? We used to try to get my daughter to make prolonged eye contact with us, but it didn't work well. When she got old enough to verbalise her issues in more detail, she told us that eye contact distracted her so that she found it harder to compose speech and keep to a topic. Also, as she is very visual but has auditory processing issues, she said eye contact made it harder for her to decode our speech as she would get distracted. So we have compromised on fleeting eye contact during a conversation, and teaching her to look in the direction of the person speaking, but to look at the nose or upper lip instead of directly into the eyes. We reckon that this way, it's less strange than if she looks away from the person. This may be an issue with some of your kids?

I also think its hard to keep looking at the other person's eyes. A good compromise would be the nose. But then we wil start noticing how much boogy that person has in those. Hahaha.