Autism conference & art

Today, I am at a madison conference sponsored by the Waisman Center that the Autism Society of Madison. It is a day with the experts with speakers who can not speak long enough for me, two panels, and a whole room full of people who are interested in learning more about kids on the spectrum. A straw pole of the audience indicated that there are mostly parents here. Mostly parents becoming professional parents with closet degrees in the autism spectrum.

I spoke to a woman after I asked a question about training peers to play with or in play groups. Her son is 5 and on the spectrum. She has made the transition from a regular teacher to an autism specialist -- Could I begin that process? -- working with preschool kids during which she runs a playgroup for little ones. She advised using using slightly older kids as peers and/or training the children in having more patience with their novice player, suggesting the same thing more than once, and then also finding the novice player's lead. We had no thought of somehow training/preparing the NT kids but this is a good idea if we can figure out how to do it.

She told me to know what goes on in school – and I told her that I was the PTO president. She laughed and high fived me.

Listening to the experts is incredible and I just want to know and work with kids with ASD more. There is so much more for me to learn. So many things that have been said apply to Julia or to the other kids that were in our play group last year. So many of the therapy programs or studies are practical, things that parents do with their kids all the time, things that we did with Cheshire, but with kids on the spectrum, those things have to be done over and over, done in other ways, done over and over. And done over and over. To teach the basics, what Julia is learning slowly from her line therapists.

Research shows that parents of children with ASD report higher levels of stress than parents of children with other disabilities including, Downs Syndrome, Fragile X syndrome, CP, and development delays.

Wow. And stress is never good.

Last night, I was cleaning out Julia's backpack which came home with a report card (with somewhat encouraging things on it) and lots of papers. I pulled out her weekend update notebook and Julia wanted it. She obviously liked everything she did in that book, and had Stephanie -- her therapist at that moment -- read what she had written. It was quite a challenge for Stephanie but Julia helped her with those words. Interestingly, Julia remembered what she had written and the rather mangled words that Julia wrote made sense to her and to Stephanie after Julia explained them.

After Stephanie left, Julia found some blank pages and started drawing. On one page she drew a tree with grass around it, a mountain, and an animal (I can't remember what right now). The tree was a leap forward in Julia drawing – Green and brown, a trunk with three big branches, two colors of green for the leaves, and heavy green but some single blades for the grass. The mountain was in red – vaguely in the background. Looking very much like she wanted to put it in the background but didn't quite get it yet. She has been drawing mountains this last week. And the Great Wall of China. I think it is inspired by watching Mulan for the first time in a long time and the opening credits which is really beautifully painted. She has been drawing mountains all week and I think that last night was the first time she put it into a scene. Julia doesn't know where to put people or things on the mountains and so for now people are too big for those mountains. I am sure she will practice this until she figures it out.

On the other page, Julia drew an ocean with three cat fish and underwater plants. It looked like a page sized fish bowl. On the top she drew a rough oval that looks like water or waves and the front and back of a tank. There are a few “cat” fish which in the style of Suess look like cats with fish tales. But then there are the sea plants. The sea plants are amazing. The leaves which are broad wavy leaves – two or three to a plant are colored a deep green with brown outline. The plant base is an oval hills each which was colored deeply – red and green – and each mound his dots of darker colors. Julia clearly got into developing those plants and they are intensely beautiful.

Julia had a good day in school yesterday. Her behavior chart had all smiles and she was very happy to be proud of what she did. When I asked her after school how the day had been she did more than answer yes or no. A lot of her answers are a review of what she had been told -- “I am staying calm,” “I am calm now.” “I worked hard.” I did a good job.” “I read two books.” Although I need to prompt Julia with questions to get some of these answers, she is more willing to share this information. We are not at fll after school conversation but we are so much further along than we were last year. And Julia does not tell me not to talk to her as much as she used to do.