Helping Children with Autism – Tips for the Parents

So when you know your child is suffering from Autism, the treatment should begin at home. No parent is prepared for it and can never be. It happens and then there is only one way to tackle it by being proactive in helping children with autism.

A professional knows how to go about it, but the parents too need to prepare themselves while understanding the right technique to do it. 

Here are the tips you need while helping children with autism:

Consistency

It is difficult to remember everything an autistic child learns in school or from a therapist unless practiced over and over again. A consistent environment is the best way to teach your kids. The best way a parent can do this is by keeping in touch with the school and a therapist and what they are being taught at a particular time.

By having different places of learning, a child is able to transfer his learning from one environment to another. A parent’s consistent interaction is also important and so is the manner they deal with while helping children with autism.

Do not let your schedule to go awry

It is seen that a child with a well structured routine performs better. A parent must make a time table and specify time for meals, school, therapy and sleeping. There should be any disruption whatsoever. If you have some events that may disrupt your child’s schedule, you must prepare him in advance.

Acknowledge Good Behavior

Encouragement goes a long way in instilling positive attitude and confidence in children. Praising a child when he completes a task or is able to learn something can go a long way. You can also reward by allowing them to play with their favorite toy or cook something they like. 

A Parting Thought

Helping children with autism is important and parents can play a huge role in it. Play the role diligently.

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How does a child benefit from Orton Gillingham Method?

Orton Gillingham method as we know is one of the oldest and most successful methods used in making dyslexic children read, spell and write better. But apart from this they learn a lot too to succeed in life.

Here are a few benefits a child gets from it:

Self Confidence

Children with dyslexia struggle with low self esteem. Orton Gillingham method of teaching helps them gain the confidence they would need in life. This is important and helps them later in their lives.

Multisensory Teaching

For an overall understanding, it is important to sensitize different parts of the brain. So when a child is exposed with different modalities like visual, auditory, and kinesthetic. This engages them in language and is not limited to learning and remembering words only. Memorizing makes use of just one part of the brain, whereas when different parts are engaged a child understands and learns things more appropriately and remembers them for a longer time.

Executive Functioning

Organization, self awareness, and taking responsibility is what Orton Gillingham method instills in children. You will agree that these are highly essential skills for a child.

The method ensures students are motivated enough to do certain activities every day and simultaneously do their tasks and stay organized. A student marks this on their blue sheet. They pen down to-do things on this sheet. They are allowed to take the sheet home and mark it when the homework is complete. When something remains unfinished, they are held responsible for it.

Repetition

This is important and a key to remembering things. The Orton Gillingham method of tutoring involves work that includes manners that work best for a child to remember things for a long time.

Parting words

Orton Gillingham method has been benefitting many worldwide. Enroll your child today, if you haven’t yet.

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How does a child benefit from Orton Gillingham Method?

Orton Gillingham method as we know is one of the oldest and most successful methods used in making dyslexic children read, spell and write. But apart from this they learn a lot too to succeed in life.

Here are a few benefits a child gets from Orton Gillingham Method:

Self Confidence

Children with dyslexia struggle with low self esteem. Orton Gillingham method of teaching helps them gain the confidence they would need in life. This is important and helps them later in their lives.

Multisensory Teaching

For an overall understanding, it is important to sensitize different parts of the brain. So when a child is exposed with different modalities like visual, auditory, and kinesthetic. This engages them in language and is not limited to learning and remembering words. Memorizing makes use of just one part of the brain whereas when different parts are engaged a child understands and learns things more appropriately and for a long time.

Executive Functioning

Organization, self awareness, and taking responsibility is what Orton Gillingham method instills in children. You will but agree that these are highly essential skills for a child.

The method ensures students are motivated to do such activities every day and simultaneously do their tasks and stay organized. A student marks this on their blue sheet. They pen down to do things on this sheet. They are allowed to take the sheet home and mark it when home work is complete. When something remains unfinished, they are held responsible for it.

Repetition

This is important and a key to remembering things. The Orton Gillingham method of tutoring involves work that includes manners that work best for a child to remember things for a long time.

Parting words

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How does Orton Gillingham Reading Program

Orton Gillingham reading program is one of the finest inventions of the past centuries. Though almost a century old, it holds its relevance even today.

Read below to learn how the Orton Gillinghamreading program helps in teaching children how to read and spell.

G Approach

·        This approach aids in decoding, breaking words into syllables and phonemes. This is what helps in reading a word.

O-G Approach

·        This aids in teaching a child to encode, break words into syllables orally and phonemes in order to spell a word.

·        It helps in building fluency and automaticity to the word level

·        It must be supported to help teach composition or continuous text fluency.

Features of Orton Gillingham Reading Program

Clear

The patterns and rules of decoding and encoding are taught. Non dyslexics can understand this, but not the dyslexics. A teacher must work with the rules and patterns. Not just this, students should be given lessons on the exceptions to these rules and patterns. They should also be educated in non-phonetic words.

Systematic and structured

It is a systematic method, new concepts are taught in the same way. This also implies that the human brain does not have to waste energy to understand a new method as a person gets what he is expecting – the same routine. Henceforth, the shift focus to learning new methods.

It is structured which means the information is laid in an orderly format.

Cumulative and in a sequence

To help a child read and write, it is extremely important to teach one rule at a time. It starts from a simple to complex and so on. Each step is built from the previous one. Hence, it is important to follow the program just like it is presented.

Summing up

Orton Gillingham reading program is multi-sensory. When more senses are used, the retaining power enhances too.

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The History of Orton Gillingham Tutoring

Orton Gillingham tutoring is basically an approach conceived and designed by two people - Samuel T. Orton and Anna Gillingham. It is misinterpreted by many as a program, wherein it is just an approach, which only a well trained and experienced trainer can use effectively with the dyslexic people.

The Use

The Orton Gillingham approach is directed towards helping people who have problem in writing, reading and spelling. These are usually associated with dyslexics.

The main content and the practice that forms the foundation of the Orton Gillingham tutoring approach is taken from two sources – proven knowledge and practice approved and legalized over 70 years.

The second source is the scientific evidence of how humans learn to read and write; how some people find it difficult to read and write; why dyslexia makes attaining literacy skills difficult; and the instructional method well suited for helping such people read and write.

The founders

Orton Gillingham approach is all work of contribution of Samuel T. Orton and Anna Gillingham. Orton was a pathologist and neuropsychiatrist. His work revolved around reading and language processing difficulties. By 1925, he had recognized dyslexia as an educational problem.

Anna Gillingham was a psychologist and educator, had a command over the language. By 1930s, Dr. Orton got instructional techniques published. This became the foundation for the Orton Gillingham tutoring.  

Orton Gillingham Approach is one-on-one teacher-student instructional model often applied in small group instructions. It has been successfully done in the classrooms. Though it was initially designed for students with reading, writing and spelling difficulties, it has been found to be more effective for students in mathematics.

Summing up

Students afflicted with dyslexics are required to hone their language skills and its relation with writing. Orton Gillingham Tutoring is their savior since they need special help; they get it aptly with it.

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How to take care of Autism Spectrum Disorder in the Classroom

A student suffering from Autism Spectrum Disorder can face multiple problems in the classroom. It is a big challenge for the teacher too. He/she must start with understanding autism and how an autistic child can be helped. Below are a few things that a teacher can apply in the process.

Read carefully:

1.    Allot tasks in a sequence in a specific order.

2.   Use simple, tangible language. Use minimum words to put your point across.

3.   Educate them some social rules or skills. These include social distance and taking turns.

4.   Fewer choices make an autistic child choose things accurately.For instance, if there are balls in three colors, picking up one of the colors would be far easier than to choose from 6 or 7 colored balls for them.

5.   A blank stare means that a child has not understood the instruction. To make it clear, ask the child to repeat your question after you.

6.   Do not use sarcasm. Children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) do not understand it.

7.   Do not use idioms. This leaves children with ASD confused.

8.   Be clear and specific, if possible. Choices that are open ended would lead them to nowhere.

9.   Always use smaller sentences. Repeat and check to know if the child has understood what you said.

10. Make a clear daily routine.

11. Warn the child when there is a change in routine or activity.

12.Students usually do not understand what finish means. Showing them a picture of what a finished thing or work would look like will help them to do the activity appropriately.

13. Address them individually. Calling them with everyone doesn’t work.

14. A slight change in behavior or manner shows anxiety. Spot it.

15. Use different presentation forms – physical guidance, visual, etc. to help the child when he finds a certain thing difficult.

Summarizing

Autism Spectrum Disorder is a developmental disorder in children. The teacher must possess the knowledge and the required skill to help the child understand, and develop his understanding skills.

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10 Signs that Say, ‘Your children have Auditory Processing Disorder

Before we zero on and say with an affirmation that your children has auditory, let us understand what is it?

Auditory Processing Disorder is

When the central nervous system, CNS, or APD doesn’t function well and thus pave way for a not so healthy relationship between the nervous system and the ears. This condition leaves a child helpless. He cannot understand the language or the sound.

APD or Auditory Processing Disorder causes issues with:

• Understanding a particular language
• Remembering the information
• Processing the conversation

Symptoms of Auditory Processing Disorder in Children

Generally, it comes across as a very chaotic condition. So, one must look for the following signs before coming to any conclusion.

• Cannot differentiate words in a noisy environment.
• Cannot follow any directions.
• Problem in making it difficult to separate any sound or speech
• Cannot read or spell
• Cannot comprehend any information within a classroom which other children can easily do.

Well, these symptoms may or may not mean auditory processing disorder for sure. So, do not conclude by reading the symptoms mentioned above that child has an auditory processing disorder. The situation is a little tricky. But these symptoms do throw some light of suspicion. Do not ignore them.

Seek professional help. They are fully qualified and can tell you exactly about its status. A group of professionals involved in the process of APD identification include psychologists, speech language, pathologists, and teachers.

In Conclusion

Well, it’s only half the purpose solved. Now begins the most important part – the APD treatment. Remember, different children respond differently to the treatment. Some are able to overcome it completely; others may not and live with it all their lives. This depends on how bad APD is and how quickly you start taking the professional help.

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