Working with autistic children is unfairly presented as being difficult and challenging. This may be true to some extent, but the ultimate satisfaction that one can get from seeing the progress made by the student is very gratifying. Working with autistic children quite often requires that you have to interact with parents and other members of the family and many specialized educators of autistic children feel this is the more challenging part of the education.
- The initial working with an autistic child can be quite upsetting and disruptive as there are no clear set of symptoms or behavior, and the child may seem to be the same as any other normal child. But when the difficulties do surface, understanding it and handling it can be quite disconcerting. There may be a feeling that one is dealing with just a temper tantrum, but the underlying autism is what dominates the behavior pattern and requires understanding that can take quite long in coming. An autistic child is unable to communicate the reason for their discomfort with any situation.
- Initially children with autism have to be integrated slowly into the educational system. There are well defined ways of doing this. Instead of using words, pictures or visual means are used to represent the day’s schedule. Each activity needs to be performed in a well defined environment so that the child associates the activity with the environment. Children will respond more easily to stories for correct behavior rather than just verbal instructions. One needs to ensure that the outside environment or noise is not allowed to disrupt the learning processes as such children can get easily disturbed, and bringing them back to normal takes a much longer time than with normal children. The classroom should be amenable to allowing a child to walk about or move about while performing any task, as this seems to help their learning. Schedules once made must be adhered to as autistic children find any change disruptive and upsetting.
- What must never be forgotten while working with autistic children is that the welfare of the children is important and all other things are secondary? Parents and other family members must be constantly spoken to and informed of the child’s development and problems. After all they do spend the majority of the time with the child, and if they can carry into the domestic environment some part of what the child goes through at school, this will be comforting to the child. The continuity makes the child more responsive and gives him/her a feeling of security.
- Some autistic children may have difficulties with communication and are therefore helped if the services of a speech therapist are available at the school or facility where the child is. There must never be any punishment to an autistic child, because quite often the child will never understand it, and will never be able to connect his misbehavior with the punishment. Rewards and praise may get better results along with autistic children interacting with a child who is more his/her own contemporary.
