Excellent post on nonverbal communicators

Hope that Gail wouldn't mind that this is posted here.  I know there are
many trying to understand the "how-to's" in the dynamics.  I had clipped
this post a while back and thought it would be helpful to share.  So, thanks
Gail!  While her comments were directed toward thinking of 3 year olds, i'm
thinking this is applicable to many age groups.

~*~ tink

Begin:

Hello everyone
I would like to add a few words to this discussion on helping a three year
old use FC.

First of all I would like to preface my comments with a short description of
my philosophy on communication, because it makes a huge difference where one
is coming from. To me, communication is the passing of information from one
person to another so that it is shared.  Thus, when I am working with
anyone, I am not interested in a specific method of communication at all,
but use everything and anything that the person is able to share with me in
any way they use. My personal communication disabilities are not being able
to use my vision to understand sign language, no matter how hard I try, or
to keep up with the visual input of the very fast facilitators on the
letterboards and speaking only the English language. These limit my ability
to communicate with some people, but we usually find a way to share,  in
spite of my limitations. My goal with people on the spectrum is to find
communication methods that work for the individual I am trying to
communicate with so that they can share their needs, their thoughts, their
feelings and their knowledge with me. The goal is communication, not a
specific method of communication. And since they have what is termed "an
impairment in communication" we concentrate on what works for them, NOT what
I, or any other typical person needs. One wonders at times who are really
disabled in this world.

Steps for communicating with a 3 year old child:

1. Lower your voice at all times when talking to them. Their hyper acute
hearing often distorts our voices so that they cannot hear the words clearly
and claim that it was no different to them than any other noise in the
background. Don't whisper. The sss sounds are very uncomfortable when
whispering but talk at a level just above whispering. Always make sure there
are no noises between you and their ears that will interfere with your
message when you are speaking to them. Don't ask them to speak louder, they
are likely talking at a level that is comfortable for them. Meet it. If they
talk very loud, this is likely how they hear you speak. Tell them it hurts
your ears, and demonstrate talking softer. This is not about them trying
harder. It's about meeting their auditory needs.

2. Share the differences that they experience in life with them so that they
get to know their own bodies and how these bodies react in our world. Tell
them that they hear better than the rest of us, see better, feel things more
on their skins, and have stronger senses of smell and taste, and that this
makes the world uncomfortable for them in ways that it doesn't make it
uncomfortable for us. They know this about themselves. They think we are
like them and don't understand how we are able to cope with so much input so
well. What no one tells them is that we are not coping with the same input,
because our bodies are different than theirs. Sharing this information with
them as early as possible, gives them the freedom to accept themselves as
the wonderful people they are instead of reaching the point that they
believe that they are bad, crazy, broken or stupid: the very clear messages
that they meet in the world every day of their lives.

3. Do not put them in environments in which they have to endure high levels
of stimulation. Typical day cares, preschools, and so on can be devastating
to these children.  If this is necessary, respect their use of restricted,
repetitive and stereotypic behaviors as communication that they are in
trouble. Allow them to use these behaviors to decrease the level of anxiety
they are feeling. Talk to them about how well they are coping in a very
uncomfortable world. The development of the brain from birth through to
grade one depends completely on sensory input. The safer that input is for
these children, the better the development. In the meantime, don't lock them
away from the world in order to protect them. They need to be part of our
world as much as any other child. Be flexible with the timing and the choice
of environments instead of limiting where they go. For example: I live in
Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, which boasts that it has the largest shopping
mall in the world, a mall that has all sorts of wonderful attractions that
go beyond shopping. By taking our children there before 10 AM in the morning
we can share this mall with them in a way that is safe for their bodies and
allow them to get used to it. We would never, ever think of exposing them to
it in the midst of the craze of Christmas shopping. That's torturing them
for no reason at all. Any early intervention program should take place in
the real world, not in one room, which becomes a torture chamber.

4. Accept any form of communication they use, when they use it, and don't
correct them or try to fix it in any way. Respond immediately. This gives
them the impetus to continue to communicate. Constantly being told that
their communicative efforts are wrong and have to be fixed, makes them give
up.

5. If they speak in garbled tones,  be aware that this is how they are
hearing you speak. This is the language they are learning from you. Take
responsibility for your own limitations and admit that YOU don't understand,
in a soft voice. You taught them how to talk this way. Now you are expecting
them to reply in a way that suits your needs. In other words you expect them
to listen at one level, and then respond at another. It's like being
bilingual. Amazingly, many of them actually do master this in spite of our
stupidity.

6. Give them choices in a way that they can respond. Put their clothes out
and let them pick up what they want. Put out two juices and let them take
the one they want. If they don't choose either, open the fridge door and
offer everything and see what happens. It's not just about pointing or
telling. Ask them to "show me" and then respond to their requests
immediately, again without correcting their method. The more you do this,
the more they will share with you. The more their communicative efforts will
evolve and increase.

7. Get them on the computer as soon as possible. Use games based on their
interests. Help them use the mouse, or find a mouse that they can work
independently. It doesn't have to be simple. I don't know how many children
I have been with who can use a typical mouse on their home computers, but
have never seen a finger mouse like I have on my laptop, and learn how to
use it after I show them once.  Move from playing games to typing. Find
games that information has to be typed in to continue, or adjust the games
settings so that this is necessary. I have 2 year olds on the computer. The
goal is to have them typing independently by they time they are in grade one
and need to share their knowledge base, which they can do on a laptop in the
classroom, if their fingers are too sensitive to print with a pencil.

8.  Use hand over hand to do specific tasks that they haven't mastered yet.
Be aware that their tactile response will affect how well this works. Tell
them "let me show you how, or let me help you" so that it doesn't become an
overwhelming. Respect their body language at all times and talk to them
about what you think it is telling you. In the future, this may be very
important in the implementation of fc.

9. Answer the "why" questions of life. Typical three years olds spend this
time of their lives asking hundreds and hundreds of questions every day,
driving the adults in their world slightly crazy. But this is how they learn
how the world works. 3 year olds on the spectrum have the same questions as
the other children in their minds but their communication impairment stands
in the way of asking them. So answer them anyway. Hang around with other
three year olds to figure out what questions are asked. Or just share the
way our worlds works in every way you can. This is probably the most
important early intervention program you can put into place. The adults talk
of the difficulty that they had figuring out how the world works, and the
huge amount of time and energy they dedicated to this cause over time. We
can help them if we choose.

10. Lower the anxiety that they are dealing with in every way you can. As
Jamie Burke stated when I was with him in Maryland last summer: "People
thought I was a child struggling to learn to talk, but I was a child
overwhelmed with anxiety. Once the anxiety decreased, the communication was
easier." Figure out exactly what is going on with their sensory system and
use whatever adaptations they need to meet their specific needs. I have lots
of these if anyone is interested. Raise your expectations. No one does well
when they are treated like they mentally incompetent, and these children are
definitely not that. Meet their communicative endeavors, don't make them
meet yours. Reduce the amount of stimulation that they have to deal with in
the environments that they are in. Take care of any medical problems they
have.

There is a huge outcry against a lot of the medical research going on, from
many of us, because we don't want to "cure" autism. The biomedical concerns
are not about curing autism, but meeting the needs of the individual body.
The lower the pain and discomfort from within, the lower the anxiety, the
higher the level of communication. We now know that there are a lot of
gastrointestinal, immune system, and environmental toxicity issues going on
with these people. Each is an individual. Each affected in their own way. If
we can figure out these concerns, we give them the freedom to feel better
which decreases anxiety level, which in turn leads directly to an increase
in communication and social interaction and a decrease in the need to use
the restricted, repetitive and stereotypical behaviors for calming
themselves.

11. If they are the type of children who watch and control videos with a lot
of repetition, etc. pay close attention to what they are doing. They are
sharing something about themselves. Then share what you know. For example,
after visiting one child, I realized that all the video portions that he had
chosen to watch in my presence had to do with "falling down". He also spent
a lot of time throwing a variety of items down the stairs. The next time I
was with him, I told him that I had realized what he was doing and I thought
he was trying to figure out exactly how gravity worked. I taught him a short
lesson on the facts of gravity and the history of our understanding of it.
He sat and listened very carefully to me without any of his behaviors. When
I was done I talked about the loss of his grandmother as his mother was
having a hard time dealing with her grief, and I wanted to make sure that he
knew why Mom was crying so much and not take it personally. Then I
apologized for taking so long to figure out what he was telling us about
"falling down" and if he had anything else  to tell me I would try to
"listen"as well as I could. He immediately went to the PEC board and got a
picture of a lake and gave it to Mom. She guessed all sorts of water things,
which were obviously wrong, and he went and got another PEC, this time with
the truck on it.

We determined that he wanted to drive to the lake, and thus, in spite of the
fact it was the middle of the winter, we decided to go. On the way we
stopped for gas, and as we were waiting for Mom to do that, he worked with
his CD player, first finding a song, and then finding a specific line and
then finally playing it over and over and over again for me. I don't
remember the exact words of the line, but it had to do with supper cooking
and daddy being home. His Dad had been working out of town for some time. I
told him that I thought he was telling me he missed his Daddy and wanted him
to come home. He stopped the repetition, so I think I got it right and he
was calm and happy for the rest of the trip  (in spite of the fact that the
road to the lake was filled in with snow so impassable) as I shared this
line with his mother. The interesting thing about this process is the fact
that he chose the lake as his PEC, not any of the places that we could visit
in town. It gave him the time to find the line on the CD. Since we stopped
for gas, we actually didn't need that time, but had we not, we would have.
This is what true listening and accepting of communication entails. Since
this happened with this boy, I have had the repetition of videos used often
as a means of communicating something that is hard for the person to say
independently. Echolalia is also part of this process. If you know the
context of the line being quoted, you can figure out exactly how it fits in
the present context. But you have to make the effort, and also accept
communication, not fix it, or you won't get this far.

12. Don't treat them any differently than you would any typical child. Don't
force them to sit in chairs. Don't force them to look at things. Don't ask
them the same question over and over again. Don't ask them questions that
you already know the answer to and so on and so on. Teach them naturally and
respectfully. The inability to sit for long periods of time, and the
resistance to look directly at something is an indication of a sensory
problem, not something that needs to be "TAUGHT".

I apologize for this being so long, but I don't think we can just assume
there is one easy answer for anything as important as communication. I hope
this is helpful.

Sincerely
Gail Gillingham
Autism Consulting Service
Edmonton, Alberta, Canada,
Author: Autism Handle with Care
 Autism, A New Understanding
and co-editor with Sandra McClennen  of Sharing our Wisdom, a book of 22
different presentations of the experience of autism from those on the
spectrum.