What would an education system for autistics be like?

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Seriously? Wow, that's a little disturbing (both directly, and the fact that failing schools are spending money on something so frivolous.)

As for the topic, I can't really imagine anything more then an environment in which there is some structure, so essential learning goals, (such as basic humanities, maths, research skills, etc,) can be met, but the child can explore their own interests, with help from the school.

Perfect educational system for autism. I have Asperger's and would have only needed someone there to give me the next book, or answer questions. Telling me what should interest me sucks.

I think that I should have been home schooled. I've always wanted to be, but my parents didn't have the time.

I would have done much better had I been homeschooled. School produced more social anxiety, more bullying, and I got usually got preoccupied with other things during class. I would have been able to study on my own time as well. Maybe the government could fund homeschool networks and coops for people with AS, NLD, HFA, Turner's Syndrome etc.

I think it would be a good idea for children and adolescents with Asperger Syndrome to be able to communicate with a Professional in the area of their special interest. If they are particularly skilled at it, they could do research work and attend conferences.

That was a while ago. To be totally fair, it's just a bluff. At least, in my experience with that particular school district at that particular time. In at least one case (probably most cases) they dropped the charges once they realized they were picking on someone with teeth. And the person they were picking on was complaining about mistreatment of her kid.

I love Ariela's ideas, but I disagree. We shouldn't rely on (or get) government funding. The thing that springs to mind here is charter school, if my half-remembered thoughts on half-listened-to and half-understood reports on the school system are accurate and the gaps are filled with the right sort of stuff. But I do like the idea of a homeschooling group.

The second idea is wonderful. Truly wonderful. The school should make every effort to contact actual professionals in the area of interest, whatever it is. The only thing is, there might be a lot of students and it might be costly or difficult. Every reasonably measure should be taken to allow a child to pursue a special interest, however long it lasts. HOWEVER LONG IT LASTS. My interest in lapwings that lasted an evening is JUST AS VALID as my interest in writing that's lasted my whole life and only wavered between special interest and interest, never less than something I'd like to hear more about. That said, of course it's unreasonable to bring in a professional for every one of someone's interests if they're that short-lived.

Who knows? Maybe lapwings may someday make a comeback in my heart and in my life. I wouldn't want to deal with having been discouraged from thinking about them.

I think there have to be computers available because there's so MUCH online. Books are great too. I think materials should be available to all students.

I think there should be a registry, an entirely voluntary one, where students may (but don't have to) list up to two special interests. Students with a subject as a listed interest get priority on books on that topic, but NOT ownership or the sole rights. It's fair, if two students both want to read a new book on dwarf gouramis, to give it first to the one whose special interest is fish, unless there's a very good reason why the other student needs it.

Such a registry for staff would be great, too. "Oh, hey, my teacher likes wolves, I like wolves, maybe I can ask him to recommend a book..."

On the topic of animals, every reasonable effort should be made to obtain the best and longest possible non-damaging, low- to moderate-risk access to animals when they're special interests. So, for our hypothetical kid who likes wolves, I know there are ways to get wolves to come visit your school (captive wolves, though that does set me to thinking...), but you consider. Is it worth it for someone who doesn't have the self-control to not rush in and try to pet it immediately? No, because that's far more than a moderate risk! You risk hurting a kid, scaring a wolf and bringing a lawsuit down upon the school. On the other hand, a responsible older student with good self-control needn't be denied the opportunity. It wouldn't be worth it if:
1. The kid is gonna screw it up due to impulse control issues
2. The animal is dangerous even unprovoked
3. Getting the kid and the animal to the same location is unreasonably difficult, dangerous or harmful (no, you do not get to visit species endemic to the no-man's-land between North and South Korea in their natural habitat unless you have access to a functioning teleporter and invisibility cloak)
4. Getting the kid and the animal to the same location at the same time is impossible (we apologize for not providing you with living dodo birds)
5. Or illegal (though I wonder if there mightn't be loopholes)

Meerkats sound reasonable if there's any legal way. Wolves sound reasonable in certain cases. Cats are fine as long as there are no unforeseen circumstances.

An aquarium or fifty would be awesome, though.

I think the big thing is to make it available to everyone. You don't have to already have something as a special interest to be afforded access to the materials on it, provided it doesn't mean someone who does have it as a special interest gets less of them, and provided you're responsible.

We should probably make parents sign a waiver before we introduce their kids to dangerous predatory animals. Also if their special interest is criminals... yeah, that might not work so well.

I've been thinking about this recently, again. Here's some hazy, half formed concept I've developed so far:

My idea was that it would be a well stocked residential school - internet access in each, single, ensuite, dorm; dim soft lighting and dull colours for the sensory aspects, with a farm, library, dojo, workshop etc in the building(s). There would be kitchen facilities available for those wishing to make their own food, however there would be a canteen providing food (from the farm, worked by those interested in farming), cooked by those who's interest is in cooking. Independent learning, with tutoring available (very useful, if you just can't understand something), and in the case of the more practical subjects (farming, cooking, engineering etc), supervision to avoid deadly mistakes.

Our government here in the UK seems hot on the idea of independent schools; they'd probably be willing to put up the initial funding.

That would cost an arm and a leg and drain the school system for NTs, thereby creating more potential resentment against us. Many of us have diverse interests. I am not particulalry interested in farming and enjoy big city life as I do not have to see anyone I know unless I arrange to meet them. One thing I would avoid at these schools is excessive therapies. They are more tailored towards the intellectually disabled and often do more harm than good. I'm more about empowering children with AS and focusing on their strengths.

Then it's a good thing the money is there - governments like looking good. You could probably get quite a bit of private investment as well.


As in, drain it of money? Extremaly unlikely. Maybe you mean, drain the school system of Aspies, thus reducing the grades achieved at said schools? (Joke, joke).


The idea would be, you could follow your interests, even if you're interested in several, wildly diverse topics.... what are you trying to say here?


I was using farming as an example of something someone may be interested in.


Agreed - any kind of therapies would be voluntary, with several bolt-holes available for those who find it not to their tastes...


Which is the point of this discussion.

I suppose and education system that would work best for all people in the autistic spectrum would be one that is highly flexible whereabouts students could learn regardless of his/her difficulites as well, each persons unique learning forms could be greatly acknowledged and utilized.I'm not that great at stating things but, I've tried with this post.

Magneto
I'm sorry I took you at face value but Charters are a very controversial topic now in the US. Charter schools receive government funding yet they can accept-and deny anyone who they wish. Often times middle class people who live in large cities start up charter schools so that their children don't have to attend school with poor inner city children. I especially take issue with ethnic themed charter schools, which are simply a guise for self segregation on the minorities part.

They're going to segregate us anyway

When discussing the initial concept, one must ignore what other people will think of the idea. I can't see much objection to it coming from anyone, except perhaps preexisting "special schools" who can see their funding withdrawn for not being effective enough, "charities" which claim that it won't work, etc.

On a somewhat related note, I've got an idea for a business venture that helps autistic people who have the technical skills, but not the social skills, required to set up a business set one up - it basically serves as a middleman, a gobetween between the customer and the business owner; I might start a new thread.

Well, I dunno if this works for anyone else, but I did great with private tutors. In a self-paced environment, I learn really quickly and cover more material than is normally possible. In traditional classes, I get bored and disengage and this causes my grades to suffer.

At my high school we have our homeroom/studyhall period known as "SRT". I think that my high school should create an SRT for autistic and Asperger's students. There was nothing I hated more than being forced to stay in an SRT for a whole 90 mins that's supposed to be a study hall only instead to be wasted with students talking, showing movies I've seen a billion times, and mandatory school assemblies.

In my version of a special SRT, the #1 thing would be that the students are not required to attend the school assemblies. The overcrowding of students into an auditorium to be given an irrelevant lecture on AIDs or whatever is a waste of their time and could drive them crazy. The SRT would be divided into two rooms: a quiet room and a loud room and the students can use whichever room suits their needs at the time. And there would be computers for them so screw the whole "no computer games rule." Also the room would be available for the students in that SRT to bring and eat their lunch in during lunch period because of the quiet comfortable isolation that the room provides.

And one more thing: students of this SRT are allowed to stay home on Homecoming day without it affecting their attendance. My AS friend was allowed to skip school on homecoming cuz his mom agreed that it was a wasteful and pointless day where nothing was gonna be learned anyway.

For a college environment a dormitory where each autistic student can have their own room is a must (along with a semiprivate). Any specialty labs would be available and opened for 24 hrs and there must be a food eatery in that building.

Also, the dorm would be a year round dormitory (like the international student dorms). I hated how I had to move in an out of various dorm buildings for the summer semester. A year round dormitory provides students the comfort of having control of their environment and allowing them to function on their own terms. Plus not many students are capable of going and coming from the dormitories during the holidays especially if they can't drive a car. The dorm would be located within walking distance of a bus stop.

As for the courses, I always found class participation grades to be so annoying. Autistic students would be given the fair advantage of being graded based on how well they know the subject. Plus the classes would be open to independent study.

Aaargh, if only the other posters were British... You American's confuse me, by making reference to things which don't happen here...

Coming at it from a UK perspective, I suggest that it should be a 13-19 age range school, at least to start with - later, the lower age limit could be moved down to 11 or 12, if it's working. I suggest the construction of cottages on site, for parents to stay in for a few nights while their children get used to (or don't) the new environment.

I'm trying to hash out this plan in the context of the UK education system... expect much use of the OU...

Perhaps, I need to make another forum. Is anyone interested?

I think it would be great if there were video games that encouraged experimentation with Discrete/Applied Mathematics concepts. These would be fantastic for everyone, not just autistics. These could be flash based, handheld casual game style Apps.

The games would be like addictive puzzles E.g.

-A Tetris style game could be used for teaching the algorithms like "First Fit"

-A Mastermind or guess the password style game for combinatorics

-A Network Map for the "Travelling Salesperson Problem"

-A Konigsberg Bridge Problem game where bridges could be added and removed and routes could be found

-A probability game involving simulated playing cards

Equations and variables could be updated and edited on the fly. These edits would effect the game graphics or vies versa.

When I studied Mathematics, I often had difficulty with visualising the problem. The problem was often presented as a paragraph of dense text that I found hard to read. I also found it stressful to have to handwrite my answers and imagine what the problem was supposed to
look like in my head. I don't know if it was an executive functioning issue, but I found it hard to imagine each stage of the problem from the text. It was exhausting.

The textbooks I had to use were not very user friendly. They were all in black and white
and had lots of text. Textbooks also aren't interactive and are heavy. I'm sorry, but my Maths textbook looked ugly and fried my brain. My iPod is much lighter and fits in the palm of my hand. It isn't bulky so can be used in confined spaces like public transport.

I'd have found it much easier to play about with virtual objects and experiment with concepts.

In Traditional Math education, you learn the abstract theory first and then apply this to written "real world" textbook problems. I believe that doing the reverse: studying a real world problem and then experimenting to find the abstract rule would be more meaningful to most people. Start with real concrete visual problems. Then find useful Math rules to solve those problems.

I think that people are far more motivated to learn about stuff that they're actually going to need in real life. They're going to think about doing DIY first. They won't want to use Pythagoras' Theorem until there's a real problem involving wood or construction they need to solve. I think that practically minded people will enjoy playing video games that are based on real world problems and issues.

Mathematics is like a toolbox. Some lessons I had were basically like someone holding up a hammer and talking about what a wonderful miracle of engineering the hammer was. We never got to use the "hammer" (Math concept) in the real world. It was like being told step by step how to hammer nails into wood without actually touching a hammer, a nail or the wood. Practical visual problems can be like solving puzzles.

I love puzzle games and manipulating patterns. Mathematics can be beautiful and elegant when it isn't stuck in a dry textbook. It's exhausting trying to follow a badly written textbook or copy some proof off of the board.

Reading a Mathematics textbook is just like reading a manual of computer code without looking at the objects generated in the monitor display. The teacher is like a preachy computer programmer who loves to go on and on about his beloved lines of code.


No wonder why kids get bored at school. Hahaha!

If Math concepts like arrays can be used to design video games, I don't see why video game design couldn't be used to teach Math.


I believe that if Mathematics can be fun, relevant, addictive, interactive and visual people will remember more.

Last edited by AmberEyes on 27 Aug 2011, 4:22 am, edited 2 times in total.