Anyone experienced with autism?

[dre]

I work as a camp counselor with 9 yr-olds, and one of my kids is autistic. He's nearly ready to integrate into normal classes, but a school structure is very different from the barely tamed chaos that is camp. We're not trained to deal with special needs kids, and I was just wondering if anyone had advice on how to calm temper tantrums from an autistic child, because his mother is far from helpful. Today for example, he locked himself in my bosses office after he hit another child who was two years younger. I managed to at least talk him away from blocking the door with his body, although he wouldn't open it for me. Basically though, we have very little idea on how to get him to cooperate when he doesn't want to. The most I know to do right now is try to talk him down and get him away from the group to be one-on-one, but it's tough when he's running away or running after someone to hit them, especially considering we're not supposed to hold/grab onto kids because of liability issues. We've established the office as his safe place to go to when he feels too angry or overwhelmed, but that can't be our only solution. We go on weekly field trips... I know the basics of how autism works and what behaviors are common, and I know he does better with one person to hang on to, but we have about 24-26 kids in our group with 2-3 counselors, which makes looking after him so intimately quite difficult. I'd really appreciate any advice.

[SpiceFan2008]

My mum used to work with an Autistic child i think... although it was never diagnosed, but i think there were elements of Autism in the child.
He didnt really seem to communicate with the class often, but he got by, although he did find things hard, and he didn't like people touching him.
I think that you will hae to be wary of him being able to fit into that sort of environment. It can be hard, becuase there are times that this boy would do things, like sports, but not other subjects like Maths or whatever.
You may need to find a common gorund, find something that he is talented in and see whether this will enable you to calm him down. If you try and be too harsh, then they probably won't listen to you, and if youn are too leinient, then they will try and get away with things.

I do believe though that the one-to-one situation sometimes can be detrimental to the child. Why? Well i think that if you take the child out of the situation or work with them solely, then they will expect this everytime something doesn't go their way or if something is too difficult to be taken out of the situation. But that by all means doesn't suggest not doing that from time to time.

Our English Literature group has been reading a brilliant book for our exam that might help slightly. It's called, 'The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time' and its written by Mark Haddon, who himeslf used to work with children with special needs, including Autism. Well, this story is centred around a you teenage boy, who suffers from Aspergers (A form of Autism) and it chonicoles his life sort of. It does really give you an insight into someone who has this condition, and might help with this, and you might even see something that relates to the child that you have in you group. I reccommend it very highly, as everyone in the group loves it, and even some teachers have read it and said how brilliant it was...

I do wish you the best of luck and hope this has helped just a little bit

[dre]

Thanks very much, that did indeed help. And thanks for the book reference! I honestly think the hardest thing for him is group games, because he tends to get angry as soon as he's tagged or hit in things like dodge ball. He refuses to get out though, so we just let him stay in and work it out so other kids don't get out if he tags them when he's "out," just to soothe tempers. It works pretty well and keeps us from having to take him to the side, which is basically impossible when he's angry anyway. I worked with a kid with Aspergers last summer and that experience has helped to some degree. Both did get angry and frustrated very easily, although over different things. Mostly we're learning with this one to just distract him and get him drawn back into a game as soon as he gets angry and set on running away or hitting someone. He even spontaneously apologized to another kid yesterday! It's a learning process but he's generally a sweet kid, so I've been rewarding him with helping me carry balls every now and then or letting him go give my boss a hug. That being said I do play fair and let my other kids help me out with stuff when they've been good too.

[spiceykatie1990]

Distracting is definitely a good idea. Also, if he needs to take a break to the side (at least when you are at the facility, have him hang out in the corner. Make sure there is some sort of a toy that he likes that is not too stressful, something to cool him down. Make sure he knows that it is not a punishment, and that it is a good thing that he is cooling down.
Another thing is make sure you give him lots of warning about the fact that you are going to switch activites. Be like a count-down clock...ex. In 5 minutes we are going to switch over to dodgeball...in 2 minutes we are going to switch over to dodgeball, in 1 minute we are going to switch over to dodgeball.
Also, if he has self-harming tendencies you might want to try distraction methods, this is just like, If he is pulling his hair, get down to his level, look him in the eye and ask him to do another task such as squeeze this stress ball or clap your hands, praise him while he is doing it and then once he is calm send him back to play in the game.
I've only worked with a few kids with Autism but I have also worked with a bunch of children with a bunch of other disabilities and these things have been pretty helpful for me.

[dre]

Thank you soo much. That's exactly the sort of advice I was hoping for.

[leegrace]

Thanks allot. I have not much knowledge about autism but now i have...