Tzoya in another post said that normal kids make the connection between the symbol( spoken language for example ) and the meaning more easily while ASD kids may not - This is a HUGE lightbulb for me
Is this the reason why ASD kids dont talk or talk late? Am I the only person in the world who did not know this ?
Are there any other reasons why ASD kids dont talk ( apart from apraxia and phycisal issues I mean - ie not talking resulting from ASD not another condition )
I would say that not making the connection between the symbol and the meaning makes a lot of sense as to why they can't talk or talk late. My son also struggles from verbal apraxia and has an extremely difficult time forming the words. I would imagine this leads to frustration (not being able to imitate sounds, words) and would be easier to give up. He will try to ask for something and if we don't understand, he gets upset. He is getting much better with intense ABA and speech therapy. He is also getting the motivation to speak as it is rewarding.Well you may be onto something there as to why ASD kids do not talk in the sense of conversing back and forth. I know I certainly needed to have mental pictures attached to words before I could use and understand them.Sarah's language took off when we paired the pic...with the meaning and tried to find the actual objects as well..ex. apple pic, verbalize apple and hold, smell and taste apple: describe apple~fruit, sweet, red, green, yellow ect...and then she knew exactly what it was. The good thing with all of the this is that once they get it they never forget...memory thank goodness is excellent so even though the teaching is tedious..and I do think motivation is a BIG factor also..they do learn it just not in the conventional way.
Nick~your explaination gave me hope that she will find the keys to social language even if it takes her longer..she is very visual and reads extremely well so I am hoping she has volumes of scripts to use on hand the older she gets till is is second nature....it is amazing how the brain compensates for this:)
I was told by our neuropsych that ASD children (and this is all ASD children across the board) have difficulty talking because parts of their brain do not communicate at all or as well as NT children's brains do. Communication requires assessment of the situation, the brain doing a sort of scan of available ways to respond, and then the ability to actually articulate the chosen way to respond. This requires the different parts of the brain to communicate very efficiently, very fluidly and very rapidly. But the ASD brain can not do this type of 'scan' so easily. It has great difficulty. It can be learned but it doesn't come naturally to the ASD brain. I don't know if this answers your question, but this is what I was told by our neuropsych. Hope this helps.stick - thanks for you insight. I feel that they tendency to be narrowly focused on an interest rather than engaging in the social world is what delayed their language more than anything. I don't think it's the autism itself that caused their language delay, but I think it's their autistic tendency to block out much external stimuli and focus on one thing intently that led to them becoming increasingly delayed, as they simply failed to notice much of the language and social exchanges that were happening around them.
I also think that language to them is more of an intellectual challenge than something that comes naturally, as others have said. They clearly have to think much harder about language than typical kids do - you can see them concentrating, trying to find the right words, and the effect (in addition to poor syntax and grammer) is that auxillary parts of verbal communication (volume, rythm, intonation, non-verbal coordination with a partner, etc) suffer - they tend to speak at inappropriate volume and there isn't as much inflection in their voice and talk over other people - that sort of thing. I haven't decided if this difficulty with co-processing language is due to the autism directly, or due to the problem described above - that simple lack of exposure to language and social exchanges (due to self imposed isolation behavior) caused certain parts of their brains to develop more slowly or simple be discarded during the natural pairing down of neurons that happens in kids - use it or lose it, kwim?
They're just not that good at it, which is a shame, because they really LOVE to talk! They have a lot to say, but they have a hard time expressing themselves. It really does appear that they are learning a foreign language and are in that stage where they have to think very hard about the words they choose, syntax, grammer, etc. and the natural flow of conversation suffers for that. I hope that they will become fluent one day, because their tendency to talk a LOT coupled with their language issues really makes them stand out, which will make them targets in the future.
ASD kids have a terrible time learning how to make inferences, and if you look at language, it is based on inferences! For example, an ASD kid might not understand that you want her to pick up her coat if you say, "Honey, I almost stepped on your coat."
In another thread, I think started by Fred, the topic of declarative v. imperative language really is the thing you all are discussing here. We talk to our kids in imperatives for many reasons: the desire for us to feel like they are undersatnding us, thus communicating with us, the ASD child's inability to carry on a back/forth meaningful conversation, and the biggest reason, I think, because they don't really understand the subltle nuances of language.
That said, through RDI, we have really been upping the d v. i language in our home, and we are seeing tremendous advances in more meaningful language. Our son is sharing things with us and learning to make inferences when we want him to do something. It is so easy to say, "pick up...", but when we say, "I think you may have forgotten something..." He is learning to follow us.
[quote="fred"]stick - thanks for you insight. I feel that they tendency to be narrowly focused on an interest rather than engaging in the social world is what delayed their language more than anything. I don't think it's the autism itself that caused their language delay, but I think it's their autistic tendency to block out much external stimuli and focus on one thing intently that led to them becoming increasingly delayed, as they simply failed to notice much of the language and social exchanges that were happening around them.[/quote]Nick, did you have any formal social skills training in school?
I am pushing assertiveness for my daughter. Hoping puberty won't regress her too much from it ...
As I said to my husband, after leaving the IEP meeting, I wish someone had done this for ME. And I do think ALL kids should get it.
Nick, I think you are completely correct about Jasper. My gut feeling is that[QUOTE=MamaKat]Nick, I think you are completely correct about Jasper. My gut feeling is that
he's always afraid the answer will be no, so he is reluctant to ask. It's like he
is traumatized by hearing no--not because he doesn't get his way, but
because he hates "being wrong". He'll often go to great lengths (with tears
in his eyes) to convince me that he "really meant I want a cookie
TOMORROW". [/QUOTE]
i relate a lil to you kat. my son had language at 2, but just single words and he always hd to be prompted. now he still has be to prompted but very litttle. he says things like "Moses likes cookies" referring to himself as Moses instead of the "I". H enever uses the word "I". Sometime she even referrs to himself as "He". He takes ST and OT and he has come a long way since he started preschool last year in Aug. He talks a lot now, sometimes he does babble or say things that dont make sense but i just try to always correct him. I know it can be frustrating but its something i had to learn how to deal with .... so he achieves his goals.
Yes I have a talker, alot like stickboy. A precociously verbal kid who wasI think a big thing that stumps us "NT" parents is the idea of talking. When our kids (NT and otherwise) are babies, we automatically teach and listen for our children to verbalize words. It seems an NT child will pick up on what a given word sounds like as well as what it "looks" like, all at the same time.
If you think of verbalizing as two different processes (sound and looks), you begin to understand how the skill of speaking can become difficult. As we all know, an autistic mind does not always compute things the way we understand, so again we are stumped.
When Tony was younger (about 2-3), he HAD language, it was just not what WE expected it to be. We used to joke in our house that Tony talked, he just spoke Japanese! He just seemed to have no interest in learning OUR langauge, or in communicating with us through words.
As our kids get older, the whole meaning of talking becomes more complex... as was discussed in the other thread. "Talking" becomes a standard term for "communicating", which of course are two totally different things.
Tony's verbalization skills have improved tremendously, but his communication skills still stink. More often than not, he "copies" lines from movies, video games, etc. to express himself. Many of us know this is quite common with our kids. Too often, he has no response at all. To him, none is necessary.
If we think about a typical conversation between two "NT" people, think about what is necessary information and what is just fluff. You'd be surprised how much would be cut out if we only verbalized the "necessary" and cut out the "fluff"!
Mary