Open Discussion Forum

  • 1.  Autistic Children

    Posted 06-24-2019 12:51 PM
    I just wanted to say that I have noticed that autistic children seem to be misdiagnosed because their behavior mirrors and has many similarities to other disabilities.
    I am so grateful that I got my daughter diagnosed and now I know what autism looks like and am better able to help students in my classroom as a teacher.

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    Cynthia Hufnagel
    Bakersfield CA
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  • 2.  RE: Autistic Children

    Posted 06-25-2019 08:21 AM
    Dear Cynthia,
    You are right that autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is very misunderstood, especially at the preschool level, where children's behavior can be masked as just being a little behind the developmental curve.  A central aspect of autism is sensory processing disorder (SPD), which most early childhood educators  have no awareness of, but SPD is actually far more prevalent than autism even, and affects 1 in 6 children to the degree of causing daily classroom disruptions.  I offer teacher-training for recognizing SPD and ASD, and creating strategies to help these kids, which helps the whole classroom, which helps us as the teachers, which helps the parents, which helps the families, etc etc!
    So few teachers have this training!  I also ended up becoming a trainer because my son was diagnosed and I realized that I was one of the few teachers who understood what was causing the behaviors we were seeing in our classes.
    Thanks for bringing this up!  If anyone would like to know more about the teacher training I do, contact me!!

    Joanie Calem
    Columbus, OH

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    Joanie Calem
    Columbus OH
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