Saturday, October 18, 2008

Autism in the Art Room

I attended a workshop on autism in the Art Room, presented by Linda Carwley from Pinellas County. She has several classes of self contained autistic students and has really done some wonderful work with them, dispite their disability. At this time I am not in this situation, but thought it might be valuable for the occasional autistic child that we do get at Chets Creek. It was enlightening to learn that giving them SIMPLE choices can create a real problem for them and that we must have patience with them while they process their choice. Being very tactile, they enjoy lessons involving texture AND color. Giving ONE instruction at a time can help keep them more focused on the project at hand as well as using "first.....then" statements to keep them on tract with the project at hand. Really received a lot of great info that can be used in my Art Room.

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