Published

Okay so here is the article in the paper to give more awareness about autism....its long but worth the read.....But then I would say that ah,LOL.

“So common, yet so misunderstood.”

That’s autism for you.
Franklin’s Alison Exelby should know.
Her elder son Steven was diagnosed with ‘moderate’ autism when he was three and a half. Now, at almost eight, he’s mainstreamed and doing ‘okay’ at school, but only because his teacher this year understands the condition and can accommodate his special learning needs.
Recently Alison was delighted to hear from this teacher that Steven has actually started a conversation with her and is beginning to interact with his peers.
Like many people with autism, Steven is intelligent, inquisitive and focuses intensely on what he’s doing.
Unlike many children with autism whose frustrations are reflected in their antisocial behaviour, Steven withdraws into himself when he’s confused or frustrated.
But it wasn’t always so.
Alison recalls her son’s first 18 months, before she knew there was anything ‘wrong’. “He was screaming a lot and seemed frustrated as though he knew what he wanted but couldn’t make himself understood.”
Steven’s progress started when his Playcentre recognised his condition and referred him to an early education psychology service.
“We learned that he was a visual learner. And early intervention ideas like the visuals workshops were a breath of fresh air,” reckons Alison. They had to travel to Howick where the workshops were run but the effort was hugely rewarding.
“They showed Steven a picture of food – say a banana – and then took his hand to touch a real banana. Then they taught him that if he wanted a banana to eat he needed to take the picture to me.” Alison recalls pictures blue-tacked all round the kitchen. “And it worked: Steven could communicate! Eventually he learned to say the words and we stop needing to use the visuals.”
Steven loves pictures and especially photographs of people and events he’s part of.
Alison has scrapbooked the process of Steven’s development and he loves nothing better than looking through the photo albums. “He needs to see pictures that look like the real thing,” Alison says. “I had to explain to the kindergarten teachers that there was no point drawing stick people as they meant nothing to Steven, and so they got the visuals that Steven could understand.”
While he had one-on-one support in his days at kindy Steven and his family still had to cope with the real world which seemed filled with judgmental people.
Alison says because children with autism are not ‘visually impaired’ people tend to assume their behaviour is naughtiness, or simply the result of poor parenting.
Nowadays Steven is considered too ‘normal’ to qualify for Ongoing and Reviewable Resourcing Schemes (ORRS) funding. At first Alison was delighted to hear the description – until she realised Steven now gets no extra help just because he’s so highly rated.
“The cut off point is if the child is toilet trained, can count from 1 to 100 and knows his alphabet.” Alison’s rueful: “Steven’s assessment level is too high. He can say the alphabet forwards and back, and the same, counting up to and down from 100 – but that doesn’t alter the fact it’s hard for his teacher to sometimes keep him on task; he concentrates on what he likes doing to the point of blocking out everything else (and so seems disobedient); he has limited social skills – and although he’s not naughty he has his own addictions.” Alison describes these: “He’s meticulous about re-arranging things, he makes repetitive noises which his teacher and classmates have learned to ignore, and he has a phobic hand action, a kind of lateral wave, which indicates he’s stressed.” She asks, “How can you expect a classroom teacher to coax the best out of children with special needs like Steven’s when she has 25 other children to teach too?”
Anything that breaks into Steven’s routine can cause him stress – like going to the supermarket, and even the start of school holidays heralds a change in his behaviour.
Conversely, anything tidily in its place seems to delight him. Alison has many photos of items lined up, re-arranged in diverse shapes and blended colours – all evidence of Steven’s passion for orderliness and his love of numbers and letters.
This creativity comes possibly from Alison whose scrapbooking hobby can absorb her for hours. “I’ve had so much pleasure in recording Steven’s progress,” she says, “and it gives me so much more pleasure to see how much the photos mean to him.”
These memories so lovingly recorded also serve as a reminder to Alison to value and appreciate every little thing. “They remind me that Steven’s a happy little boy most of the time and being able to watch him learning to speak has been interesting and rewarding. Steven’s taught me a lot,” she says simply.
And she suggests the general public could learn a lot too.
“Autism is so common – and so misunderstood. People who know of a child with autism are often scared of the situation and don’t know how to cope. They can so easily get books out of the library and search the internet for information, and even spend time with the parent and child to learn more.” Alison adds: “Please don’t just label the child. And don’t condemn the parents. They need more help, not criticism.”
Footnote:The Ministry of Education has a web-site resource at www.minedu.govt.nz which is designed to give an insight into some of the challenges faced by school students with autism spectrum disorder(ASD) and includes valuable links. Althought aimed at teachers this information is also useful for other people supporting children and young people with ASD, including parents. It introduces some of the characteristics of these disorders, and suggests practical strategies for support. The Ministry also provides this information at no charge in booklet form and this booklet is available from the Post newspaper at reception, 18 Bowen Street, Waiuku.

So there you have it my story...well our story. They had photos of Steven also with some of his many patterns and I was hoping they would use that photo but the used the one of me instead...never mind its not that bad a photo I guess.

With all this stormy weather this is what it has done to the little garden shed I have outside....its now in pieces with a couple of concrete blocks on it to hold it all down. Very scarey as when we were pulling it apart the wind nearly picked up a couple of the side piece and took them away but we manage to save them in time.

So lovely goodies from Scrappin patch, I just loved these little stickers when I first saw them on a layout of Hannahs and asked what they were called and then went on my search to find them...then when introduced to Scrappin Patch website I found them so they arrived along with a RAK...thank you very much lovely my goodies. If you have time pop over they have lots of great products.

And a couple of my now favourite cosmo cricket get happy goodies I got of the good old trade me