I spent about 2 separate 1 hour sessions looking after S'r (the supposedly autistic child) today.
He seemed unsettled, acting like a child who was very tired. We were in the outdoor play area, and whenever I put him down, he bolted straight for the door back into the nursery. When I picked him up, he cried and struggled, but occasionally suddenly leaned his head against me and kept quiet and still, as though sleeping.
When I was holding him, I tried to make eye contact with him, but failed. I rotated my body while holding him, and his eyes seemed focused on something, because his pupils kept darting to stay in the same position. I turned around and rotated my body again, and once again his eyes seemed transfixed on something.
When we were indoors, S'r's focus seemed to be either climbing things or knocking things over. I was told he was extremely gifted, and thus was looking for a challenge by climbing things. I didn't find that very convincing at all.
Anyway, it appeared to me that he took 7-coloured triangles at random (simply from the top of the container), and stuck them together. Later on, the same staff member who told me how gifted S'r was asked me who'd put the triangles together. She then pointed out how amazing it was, because the colours were arranged exactly according to the colours of the rainbow.
I was also told he's very good with numbers. He excels at arranging numbers in order, and when given a phone/calculator he pressed the numbers in rising sequence.
Moving Forward
Having looked after S'r for only a short amount of time, I can understand why Special Education Needs children need 1-to-1 attention. He has to be watched constantly because he likes to climb things, and knock things over.
Also, his 'Special Education Needs' doesn't mean he learns at a slower pace than others. On the contrary, the child may be a genius! (I don't even know what all the colours of a rainbow are).
Despite his lack of social skills, S'r recognised the man (parent or carer, I do not know) who came to collect him, and immediately ran to him as any other child greeting a parent would. And when he's not distressed by something, I find that he's always very cheerful, laughing, smiling and singing to himself all the time.
2 comments:
Very true, Mark. Children with special needs need teachers who understand their learning style. They can excel in the area/field that they are interested in if the right support is given. In Silver's case, he may be interested in height, ie. high structure, parachuting, climbing mountain, etc. Rainbow is something high in the sky. Of course, more observations need to be done to ascertain his real interest and learning style (this is my assumption).
I can't really comment fairly on Silver, because I haven't spent that much time with him.
I can, however, say it's doubly tiring looking after him because he's quite heavy and always needs picking up. ^_^
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