Bio:

Temple Grandin, PhD., is a gifted animal scientist who has designed one third of all the livestock-handling facilities in the United States. She also lectures widely on autism - becasue Temple Grandin is autistic, a women who thinks, feels and experiences the world in ways that are incomprehensible to the rest of is.
In her unprecedented book, Thinking in Pictures, Grandin delivers a report from the country of autism. Writing from the dual perspectives of a scientist and an autistic person, she tells us how that country is experienced by its inhabitants and how she managed to breach its boundaries to function in the outside world. What emerges in Thinking in Pictures is the document of an extraordinary human being, one who, in gracefully and lucudly bridging the gulf between her condition and our own, sheds light on the riddle of our common identity.

ARTICLE:

Rigidity in both behavior and thinking is a major characteristic of people with autism/AS. They have difficulty understanding the concept that sometimes it is OK to break a rule. I heard about a case where an autistic boy had a severe injury but he did not leave the school bus stop to get help. He had been taught to stay at the bus stop so that he would not miss the bus; he could not break that rule. Common sense would have told most people that getting help for a severe injury would be more important than missing the bus. But not to this young man.

How can common sense be taught? I think it starts with teaching flexibility at a young age. Structure is good for children with autism, but sometimes plans can, and need to be, changed. When I was little, my nanny made my sister and me do a variety of activities. This variety prevented rigid behavior patterns from forming. I became more accustomed to changes in our daily or weekly routines and learned that I could still manage when change occurred. This same principle applies to animals. Cattle that are always fed from the red truck by Jim may panic if Sally pulls up in a white truck to feed them. To prevent this problem, progressive ranchers have learned to alter routines slightly so that cattle learn to accept some variation.

Another way to teach flexibility of thinking is to use visual metaphors, such as mixing paint. To understand complex situations, such as when occasionally a good friend does something nasty, I imagine mixing white and black paint. If the friend’s behavior is mostly nice, the mixture is a very light gray; if the person is really not a friend then the mixture is a very dark gray.

Flexibility can also be taught by showing the person with autism that categories can change. Objects can be sorted by color, function or material. To test this idea, I grabbed a bunch of black, red and yellow objects in my office and laid them on the floor. They were a stapler, a roll of tape, a ball, videotapes, a toolbox, a hat and pens. Depending upon the situation, any of these objects could be used for either work or play. Ask the child to give concrete examples of using a stapler for work or play. For instance, stapling office papers is work; stapling a kite together is play. Simple situations like this, that teach a child flexibility in thinking and relating, can be found numerous times in each day.

Children do need to be taught that some rules apply everywhere and should not be broken. To teach an autistic child to not run across the street, he has to be taught the rule in many different places; the rule has to be generalized and part of that process is making sure the child understands that the rule should not be broken. However, there are times when an absolute adherence to the rule can cause harm. Children also need to be taught that some rules can change depending on the situation. Emergencies are one such category where rules may be allowed to be broken.

Parents, teachers and therapists can continually teach and reinforce flexible thinking patterns in children with autism/AS. I hope I have provided some ideas on how to do this while still accommodating the visual manner in which they think.

Temple Grandin, PhD., is a gifted animal scientist who has designed one third of all the livestock-handling facilities in the United States. She also lectures widely on autism - becasue Temple Grandin is autistic, a women who thinks, feels and experiences the world in ways that are incomprehensible to the rest of is.
In her unprecedented book, Thinking in Pictures, Grandin delivers a report from the country of autism. Writing from the dual perspectives of a scientist and an autistic person, she tells us how that country is experienced by its inhabitants and how she managed to breach its boundaries to function in the outside world. What emerges in Thinking in Pictures is the document of an extraordinary human being, one who, in gracefully and lucudly bridging the gulf between her condition and our own, sheds light on the riddle of our common identity.

"Reprinted with permission from the July - August 2002 issue of the Autism Asperger's Digest, a bimonthly 52 page magazine devoted to autism spectrum disorders. Published by Future Horizons, Inc. For more information: www.autismdigest.com <http://www.autismdigest.com> or call 800.489.0727."