TreeShadow wrote:
Instructions for assignments need to be extremely clear and well structured. I am very good at following directions, but when left with an open-ended assignment where the professor says something like "just choose whatever topic you want," that gives me severe anxiety and I have absolutely no clue what to do (it's not just that I can't think of a topic, I feel truly lost and confused), even if I understand the subject matter well. Even if they still gave the rest of the class an open-ended assignment, I would have appreciated if my professors assigned me a specific topic and gave out clear and definite written instructions.
This is very perceptive indeed.
ASD people in general tend to suffer from 'analysis paralysis', meaning that leaving their options wide-open (or not defined at all) will result in a complete inability to apply themselves to the relevant subject at any level whatsoever, which has particularly strongly-influential effects upon students, where this condition can result in their overwheling uncertainty and anxiety about the level of work that is subjectively acceptable (most ASD students can perform well in excess of expected standards, but (a) do not believe their own capability to do so and (b) are fearful that they will be assessed by 'social standards' relating to other students' submissions, which of course they cannot anticipate at all).
Wherever possible ASD students should be able to enter into discussion with tutors who set such assignments, in order to mutually explore the subject area, identify aspects that interest the ASD student, and agree on an area of focus for that assignment (ideally including a specific and strictly-definitive title for that work), and that tutor should be available throughout the allotted period within which the work should be completed, should the ASD student require further feedback or guidance.
One aspect of ASDs is the reduced/wholly absent capacity for social imagination, so the tutor should take on a personally-responsive role as an agent who seeks to aid the ASD student in exploring and mapping this unfamiliar terrain.
20 Nov 2013, 9:54 pm
