Teaching Aspergers IT Students. (3D vs Language Menu's)

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Hi,

I am a parent who has a Aspergers child, and teach at a school which has a Learning Support Unit.
I have several Aspergers students in my IT lessons, however have noticed a interesting pattern between my son & my support students.

Typically my students find it hard to follow basic instructions when I teach a software program like Photoshop, which has several hidden menus
linked to a "Language" Menu interface. They often ask for step by step assistance, which is high maintenance for the teacher. As a result, a support teacher helps these students
in class.

I introduced a 3D design program which has no Language Menu's. The first program was the Lego LDD design program which is free, and allows a student to create a stop animation film. I did not have to provide any support for my Aspergers students. They were very happy to use the software, and found it easy to create the project.

My 7 year old son is obsessed with playing LEGO Starwars, Batman or any 3D Simulator. It seems to calm him down, which is a contradiction to what we would have thought,
however this seems true for Aspergers children.

Anyway, I have suggested to the LEU (Learning Support Unit) to introduce a few 3D simulators, like Farming Simulator Gold.
I have collected a number of Simulators and am trying them out with my son and other students.

I was interested to find the site 3dhomeschooling and the information related to Aspergers kids.

It looks like the 3D world of computer graphics might be a real life saver for Aspergers children.

Cheers
Sean

Yes I was absolutely amazed by 3DSM, but many of the times, I just got stuck learning on my own. I recommend making an in depth picture + worded tutorials with references like highlights and circles to illustrate what you mean to do in the images. It's a lot of work in the beginning, but will ultimately reduce the time it takes for others to learn. I found these kinds of tutorials helpful for me, whereas many tutorials are unspecific in detail. I had even made my own tutorials like this for Fruity Loops Studio and found that many people rather liked my tutorials because I was so in depth and didn't leave anything out that was considered context. I usually make sure they're "n00b-friendly".

Hope this also helps you out with that, though... Don't think you were asking for advice.

I guess I'll give that a look too. I'm still interested in 3D stuff.

I have friends who play this game called Minecraft that is good for building things in too, I hear.

Hi,

Thanks for the info. I agree about the tuts. I love a series of books called Classroom in a book by Adobe, which
never leave out a step. Great to teach with.

Cheerio
Sean

You should be aware that not every Aspie will appreciate graphics over menus; I personally really prefer having written instructions and word-based menus rather than images, with step-by-step written instructions as the absolute best option. They do have to be relatively logically arranged (sometimes they aren't). I do tend to search for information on the Internet before I need to ask questions. Don't know if your lab is Internet connected; teaching kids to do a simple Web search would be a really useful skill.

Myself, I learned best with the intricate menus. I remember seeing the kids in my class fail time after time in Photoshop and things of the sort. Whereas I'm just flying through all of the menus and I'm often steps ahead of the teacher. I didn't know that I was an Aspie at the time, but it sure as heck makes sense. Especially reading your words, pointing out how Aspie's seem to have an easier time with things like that.

I do not feel that I have any preference for graphical or textual menus, although I use most of my software directly from learned keyboard functions.

When I do use menus, two issues really bother me. The first is nested menus where the designer's categories have no relation to mine (e.g. Voice Memo is underneath Entertainment on my phone, not under Utilities along with Text Memo and Calendar). The second is the "mutating" menus in many programs, where functions drift to the top as you use them and disappear if you don't use them - I have real trouble when something is no longer where I last saw it, and feel a lot of unpleasant emotion about lost things.

Web accessibility guidelines (e.g. http://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG10/wai-pageauth.html) don't have much to say about the kinds of cognitive deficits that affect people with autism.

I'm the same way. I find anything 3D is very calming to play.

There's a new Lego game coming out in october, Lego Universe. Its an online RPG with Lego and it has an excellent building system. It comes out October 26th. I'm testing it right now and it is quite fun.

You should check it out. It sounds like something he would like. There is a draw to be entered into the testing phase (I dunno how much longer it will last) and there are in-game videos on the website.

http://universe.lego.com

Thanks for all the feedback so far.

Great 2 see that not every Aspie is the same.

Will keep this in mind when teaching

Regards
Sean