By Michael Chissick, primary school teacher and qualified yoga instructor, and specialist in teaching yoga to children with Autism Spectrum Disorders, and author of Frog’s Breathtaking…
“Kids with High Functioning Autism (HFA) and Aspergers, are very self-aware, and crave social interaction. We work with them to facilitate this, not only to make socialising a rewarding experience but to help them see and remember how it is achieved. It requires constant and persistent reinforcement, but it really pays off. “
“Getting a child with ASD into a garden has so many benefits, not least that they are given some autonomy outside. The most immediate benefit will be a sense of relief and welcome break from the classroom environment. Whilst gardening, we’re practicing social interaction and life skills, and working with soil and plants helps to reduce tactile defensiveness. Learning basic horticultural skills educates in context, and along the way you will also see an increase in language and communication skills.”
“When I assign this book to parents, they unanimously say: ‘That’s it! That’s my child!’ It is so exhilarating to understand the core issue and apply strategies that work.”
In the third video instalment of Josh Muggleton‘s Top Tips for Parents, Teachers and Professionals, Josh addresses how to improve communication with young people on the…
“…historically, the intervention for children with emotional and behavioural difficulties has generally been based on behaviour improvement on a cognitive level rather than looking at the meaning behind the behaviour. For a school to accept that a deeper understanding and interpretation of behavioural difficulties is necessary to meet a child’s needs on a sustainable level is a big leap of faith. Therapy is about change and the capacity to maintain changes, and this book can help allay the fears that prevent schools from embracing this mode of intervention.”
Before Christmas, JKP author Josh Muggleton came to our offices and recorded a series of top tips for parents, professionals and people with Asperger syndrome,…
“Underachieving children typically don’t feel connected. The process of training children to reframe their visual connectedness with the world is not only about vision. It is about utilizing vision to reframe the relationship between children’s inner reality and their external reality. Vision is merely the vehicle, the classroom, the training ground. The true benefits accrue when a child, perhaps your son or daughter, takes what he or she has achieved in the safe and nurturing environment of therapy and applies it to the outside world. It is then that a child’s entire sense of who they are and what they are capable of, has been modified for the better.”
Before Christmas, JKP author Josh Muggleton came to our offices and recorded a series of top tips for parents, professionals and people with Asperger syndrome,…
“The idea was born out of a spirit of collaboration that came up when we noticed that our students were working on similar projects but with an OT or SLP spin. Another way we came together was when the speech team would make quesadillas with the students to work on sequencing, vocabulary and describing goals. And the OT would say, “Can I jump into your activity to practice cutting the quesadilla into triangles with my student?” And so we began to purposely create activities around both OT and SLP goals. We recently found out that the University of California – San Francisco has built therapy rooms for the explicit purpose of the collaboration between therapists. This is a wonderful step towards collaborative therapy.”