Autism
From “Autism and the Obama Connection”
As Doug’s mother, I have lived in the heart of autism and I have smiled more than I have cried. I have written books, stories, and poems about autism and friendships. I have presented to thousands of people interested in autism, but in each light of dawn I see the faces of those who helped my son grow and among those images there has always been Jeff.
Jeff set a Reul for friendship and taught us all how important it is. Jeff put his arm around Doug at the Obama rally some 21 years later. He inched Doug by his side and said, “How’s life little buddy,” as he placed an Obama hat on Doug’s head and a pin over his heart.
Get the whole story on The Story Shelf,
Jeff Reul and Doug Harrington at a Las Vegas Obama rally
Kathie Harrington’s books on autism are filled with stories, strategies, and speech/languae interventions. The “Jelly Bean Book” and The “Popcorn Book” were written to inform and inspire parents and therapists. Leave a blog message to find out about obtaining your own copies.
The Jelly Bean Book and The Popcorn Book were written to inform and inspire parents and therapists.
An online continuing education course, “Autism Characteristics and The Ten Laws of Success For People with Autism,” is available through:
- Autism is a reason, never an excuse.
- Success builds success.
- “Nobody ever rose to a low expectation.” Carl Boyd
- Fear is not an option
- Small steps grow into giant leaps.
- Interaction across and within environments is essential.
- Visual learners need to see.
- Blended therapies mix well.
- “Laughter is no detriment to learning.” Walt Disney
- The top line is independence.
None of the above stands alone.
They should all be blended together during daily activities.
Kathie Harrington, M.A., CCC-SLP
Celebrate Children
Characteristics of Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD)
Check the characteristics that are observed over a period of time and on a consistent basis.
| difficulty mixing with peers | acts as deaf | |
| resists learning | no fear of real dangers | |
| resists change in routine | uses people as “tools” | |
| inappropriate laughing and giggling | not cuddly | |
| physical over-activity | no eye contact | |
| inappropriate attachment to objects | spins objects, sustained odd play | |
| destructive and aggressive at times | aloof, standoffish manner | |
| All characteristics do NOT have to be present for ASD to be suspected. Autism is a lifelong disability. Pervasive Developmental Disorders
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Kathie Harrington, M.A., CCC-SLP.
Good Speech, Inc.
Hi Kathie,
We’ve enjoyed checking out your new site! Look forward to visiting more.
John and Becky Buckley
Hey Kathie, I love Shannon’s story. It’s the small things that bring so much joy in our lives. The things others may not notice, but because we are ” Mom” we see it with a huge heart and a big smile!
Hi Kathie,
I am very interested on finding your jelly bean and popcorn books. I have a 14 year old sone who was diagnosed with autism at he Special Children’s Clinic in Las Vegas. It’s been an interesting and joyful ride ever since! We have since moved to Pennsylvania and my son attends middle school with part-time resource. I will be visiting this site often!
Barbara Tabak
Thank you Barbara. Isn’t it a small world with the Las Vegas connection. I personally
have some of my books for sale. They are full of strategies, stories, information and
inspiration. I’m certain that you would find them useful for your son. I’ll be in touch
with you by E mail.
Hello, I am interested in purchasing your books. Is this still possible? thanking you in advance, Deirdre Murphy
I am also an SLP and the mother of a high functioning 30 year old son with Autism. My husband is also a pharmacist! My son can get himself to work and back home by walking or riding a bike, but could never pass the driving test . He can read and write and manages his checkbook better than myself because he has to enter it in his ledger and subtract the money immediately to find his balance (which I always forget to do!)
When he was young at 18 months old in a stroller, he was reading a calendaron the wall in a store in the next town and kept saying, “Daddy’s store!” When I handed the woman my check and she noticed my last name, she pointed to the calendar that she had gotten from my husband’s pharmacy which said “Delmonico Pharmacy” on top. I hadn’t noticed it. We thought Anthony would be a genius,but soon found out that he wasn’t. At the pediatrician”s office he always needed to get 1/2 doses of the DPT shots as he would get fevers of 102 or 103, and at 2 and 1/2, he had a 105 fever after the MMR shot! After that,I noticed the sparkle had left his eyes, he began repeating things we had said weeks ago, and lining up his toys. He never lost his speech, but needed to learn new vocabulary, syntax, and language concepts, and pragmatic language skills from direct instruction. Thank goodness I was already an SLP who knew how to facilitate language! He would only talk to his father and myself, and when other people asked me why he wouldn’t look at them or answer them, I told them that he was autistic, and they would say, “Isn’t that nice, he’s artistic.” No one knew what autism was back then because it was estimated that autism was occurring only 1 in 10,000 births! What a difference today!
When it was time for school, and we needed a formal evaluation of his hearing acuity from an audiologist, I went to my friend’s office. In the sound proof booth I helped Anthony learn to throw a block in a box when he heard the sounds from the audiometer. After awhile, I noticed that he was throwing the blocks in when there was no sound and I told him so. My friend said, “No, he is hearing sounds, but I’m at -10 dB and he is correct, even though you can’t hear it, and he could probably keep on going. He has very acute hearing sensitivity!” So it was difficult for Anthony to listen to his teachers because he couldn’t filter out the other classroom noises. We started investigating different medical approaches to help him to focus better such as megavitamins, chelation therapy to remove heavy metals from his body, a gluten free and preservative/additive free organic diet, auditory integration therapy,ritalin, prosac, and shots to regulate his digestive system. Nothing worked, or maybe they all worked a bit. He attended special ed classes and graduated high school. He attended a vocational school also part-time, where he focused on learning landscaping and horticulture. He has worked part-time at a farm, a golf course and a framing store.
I have always worked in public schools ,but lately for the past 7 years I have worked exclusively with the autistic population. More and more, I see ABA behaviorists taking over our role because they think that they know everything about language development and tell parents that their children don’t need speech therapy because they are working on verbal behavior . More and more private schools are being opened up by parents with no therapies at all , but with ABA 24/7 . Some (very few) schools say that they have a “speech therapist consultant” who will tell the ABA specialist what to do so they can take over. I saw an article by Dr.Carbone stating that behaviorists can easily teach from the Kaufman Speech Praxis Kit to work on imitation and speech sound production for autistic children who are apraxic I see more and more kids who can’t respond or initiate speech without maximum prompting, use only the same scripted speech in the same activities using the same materials over and over again , work for chips, pretzels or candy all day long, never work in a group in a natural setting, can’t generalize anything they’ve learned functionally, and have not learned to play, socialize, or interact appropriately with others because pragmatic language skills have not been included in their daily routine! ABA has it’s place initially with severely involved autistic children to help them to become responders,after that, they need to become interacters!
I thank God that my son was too old to have been influenced by ABA in the schools! He is independent, can cook and clean, does his own laundry, landscaping and planting around the house, is sociable, and can carry on a conversation(about things that interest him), and is a very hard worker. All without ABA!
We have a lot in common, Terri. More than one can imagine. ABA perspective to be for sure! I’ve seen it do good but I most certainly believe like you in that we would have robotic adults with autism today had we followed a path of ABA long ago. In the days of Ivar Lovaas when we were young mothers it MUST be remembered that he believed that electric shock and cattle prods were the solutions for children like ours. I personally burned his writing along with Bettleheim and his cold mother theory.
ABA is behavioral and that has its place with children with autism. What ABA does NOT do, however, it does NOT do a dance of pragmatics with children with autism and it does NOT teach speech and language in developmental, logical order. PERIOD!
PRAGMATICS SETS LANGUAGE IN MOTION! Without pragmatics (social language skills) language is empty, hollow, stagnant, inactive, dull and dormant. How many ways can I say it. I’m going to blog about this today, Terri. You’ve set my mother and speech therapist soul on fire once again. I’m going to quote from your comment because you, too, have been there and you and your son have danced in that dance that only we can know. Aren’t we better for that? Our sons have made us better mothers, better speech pathologists, better advocates, better people, better wives, and better communicators in order to share what we know to be true. We must continue. Thank you for writing.
your site s wonderful! I am the mother of three children who are on the autism spectrum, but only one needs 24 hr supervison and alot more extra care. My oldest daughter is high level funtionable she pulls straite a’s in school and is very active in the comunity, but still has problems with socale behavor as her brother does. my youngest steven is the one we all have learned so much from. he is nonverbal autistic but uses sign lanquage and gestures to tell us what he wants. and we have high hopes for the new year for we are introducing new things to promote verbal comunication he has his own site as well come check it out if you would like.
hi Kathy i have a 24 month old little boy that was diagosed last feb with autsim and i would like to know how to get a hold of your two books and info that i can get on what he goes through would be great. chasity
Chasity, I would be happy to sell you one of my books as I have several. Since your son is only 24 months I believe that you would find the “Jelly Bean” book the most usefull. It has many strategies for that age group. Let me know your contact information. My best to you and your family. Kathie