About Repetitive Learning and Developmental Stages, and Swimming
I’ve started teaching summer school, in a special program for local high school students and a course on translating Virgil’s Eclogues. The Eclogues are pastoral poems about shepherds and poetry and…….ok, that’s a bit too far from the usual discussion on this blog. The other class is on Psychology and Literature and, as of today, we’ve read this, this, and this, and discussed Freud’s theories of psychosexual development (the oral stage, the anal stage…..) and Erik Erikson’s 8 stages of psychosocial development—-and I’ve been reflecting on how different Charlie’s development has been.
I know that these theories are “just” theories; that they’re grids for stages and norms that no actual human being can ever completely fit her or himself into. It’s certainly taken Charlie longer—his development is “delayed”—-to manage being at school; he certainly has relationships with his peers—the boys in his class, the kids he bowled with on Wednesday—but it’s not exactly “friendship.” It is being-together-ship and kind of doing the same thing, and learning to get along when someone else cries or gets upset. If you were to chart Charlie’s gross and fine motor developmental milestones, the line would be a complete tangle. Charlie was late to attain most gross motor skills, seemingly on-time with some fine motor ones and not at all with others.
What intrigues me about the latest study on autism genetics is that, while it seems that there are multiple genetic causes for autism (and that it’s possible that a different gene is mutated in each autistic child), these different mutations seem to have similar effects in that they inhibit neuronal activity and, in particular, the connections that neurons make in response to a child’s experience. Sometimes I can tell that Charlie is not figuring out how to recognize a printed word (”blanket”) because he’s stuck on identifying the individual letters and not sure how to string them together. Or I’ll give him a multiple-step request (”put the bag in the bottom cabinet and shut the door”) and he’ll do all the steps, but out of order (the door gets opened and shut and the bag ends up in front of the cabinet).
The new study is said to support the use of behavioral therapy as it exposes autistic children “to a rich environment and highly repetitive activities that may help turn on the genes and strengthen synaptic connections.” ABA, while not a perfect science, has been the main component of Charlie’s education and while ABA is a lot more than repetitive learning, doing the same thing again and again has helped Charlie learn some of the things he likes to do so much and that are fairly complicated, such as bike-riding and playing the piano while reading music. Doing the same thing over and over again doesn’t have to be boring and rote: It can be a chance to keep “getting” something, to making it better, to learning something so well, it’s just second nature. As Charlie pushes himself off to ride down the street I can tell something “clicks” and his brain and body remember what to do to ride a bike. We haven’t been practicing piano as much and Charlie’s been pausing a bit more to figure out a note and where his finger should go, but then he remembers “how it goes” and the music comes.
I know such repetitive, overly structured learning is not the type of education for every autistic child, for many non-autistic children. It’s something to see Charlie know something so well—swimming, for one thing—that he can be concentrate on something besides the task at hand, on interacting and being with other children.
This was precisely what happened Wednesday at the pool. The afternoon started out with Charlie being completely jarred when his speech therapist called, very distressed, as someone at the place she’s working at in the summer might have infected others with something. She of course did not want to pass anything on to Charlie who had his heart set on seeing her and called her name over and over and over and sat by the window when she did not appear. It was so evident, his mind was in a “speech therapy groove,” and what he was visualizing was abruptly eliminated.
Charlie got slowly into the car to go to the pool. A little boy was having a lesson in the shallow end and I directed Charlie to put the big red and blue boat into the deep end. We were floating and swimming around when the doors open and 40 children—boys and girls, Charlie’s age—appeared and were soon all in the pool. They were in the YMCA’s summer camp program and the pool was not only crowded, it was chaotic. Extra lifeguards appeared (though the camp staff didn’t seem too worried and sat on a bench and conversed). I hung about with Charlie in the deep end; he kept doing his usual thing, sinking to the bottom head or feet first, swimming on his back with his eyes blissfully closed, putting his face in and kicking up a storm. He moved automatically among kids splashing, swimming, hollering, twirling, diving, and whatever else you can do in a pool. He made eye contact a few times with other kids (Charlie didn’t know what to say; being in the pool, he could just keep swimming). He swam into the middle of their games and maneuvered himself easily out of the way.
After dodging pre-adolescent swimmers, I decided to indulge my adult privileges and went to swim in a lap lane. Charlie joined me for a bit, but always kept swimming under the rope, to be among the other kids.
Later in the evening, for the first time, he called me to practice the piano with him.
It’s not when you reach a stage, but sure great if you do, and all the connections come together.
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POSTED IN: Adolescence, Friendship, Genetics, Literature, Psychology, Water, piano
10 opinions for About Repetitive Learning and Developmental Stages, and Swimming
Andrea
Jul 11, 2008 at 6:31 am
Go Charlie! That’s great that he’s got something that can bring him such peace!
I took Gus to the beach yesterday (first time since being off the meds) and he was so happy! The beach was more crowded than I’d ever seen it, but he was fine - didn’t hold his ears once. He’s developed a fear of the deep water again, but he’ll get there when he’s ready.
On another note, it’s interesting about ABA. I was talking to his summer teacher about seeing if we can get Gus ABA services for the fall instead of trying another medication. Don’t know if the district will go for it though.
Marla
Jul 11, 2008 at 7:30 am
Wow. I can’t believe he did so well in the pool with so many other children. M would have not been pleased. I don’t think I would have handled that many children well either. ;)
farmwifetwo
Jul 11, 2008 at 7:57 am
“I know such repetitive, overly structured learning is not the type of education for every autistic child, for many non-autistic children.”
I got told “He’s never going to learn to print if he doesn’t print these lines properly”… they do HOURS worth and note it on their charts. Scissors… was just as bad. Me “he’s bored”. Them “Autistic children are not bored” (yeah, right!!!). 2yrs later… and he prints/spells/reads at a Gr 2 level and he’s 6 and 7mths old… who’s right now?????
I hated it (besides the T’s) b/c they never allowed him to learn. Rote learning isn’t learning, it’s training. And when they told me I had to carry a fanny pack with “treats” so when we were in the store, home, wherever to stuff one in his mouth when he was good…. It was very wrong IMO. He couldn’t play, he had to do his 6 activities in his book when I was making supper or something else to keep him busy. Of course, both of those instructions I ignored.
So… I have little use for it.
But the idea of “turned off” genes or links intrigues me, b/c I see the changes and jumps over the years in the boys and at times it’s in a fingersnap, other’s I notice maybe a month later all of a sudden and then recognize the slow changes and growth.
Glad he had a great time in the pool. The boys love theirs. I haven’t had them for formal lesson’s yet. It’s on next summer’s “to do” list.
S.
Andrea
Jul 11, 2008 at 8:07 am
Farmwife: I can relate to what you’re saying about that type of teaching/training. I was very much against it when Gus was first diagnosed, but I was talked into it by a social worker, and I ended up with the best teacher who ever worked with him. So I can’t say it was strictly the ABA protocol that worked for him, but possibly had more to do with the individual. She used the method to train him to do things like stop before he ran into the road or to stay with me when we went to the playground. I didn’t want her using edible rewards, so she figured out what else would work for him. Turned out that praise was the big winner, and the only thing he never gets bored with (go figure). If I can get the district to get him those services again (even if I don’t get the amazing teacher), that would be my preference to trying more medication to get him through the school day.
Out of curiosity, what finally worked to get your son writing?
Bonnie
Jul 11, 2008 at 8:10 am
Yay for Charlie! Seems sometimes they can handle situations (aka a ton of children in a small area) better than we can. Casey too seems to steer towards groups despite not really wanting to necessarily do what they are doing, but being on the fringe so to speak. It stresses me out sometimes but any social inklings have to be good.
Robin H. Morris
Jul 11, 2008 at 11:08 am
Kristina, your story about giving a directive and Charlie placing things out of order reminds me of the time when our Paul was young. I could not imagine that he would ever be able to understand 3 or 4 step directions. (We were Lovass supporters. ABA was our mantra for years. )Then one day, I simply said to please go upstairs into my closet and get the bag in the back and bring me the new shoes. Presto! He returned with the shoes in hand and I just stopped. How many parents wouldn’t give it a second thought. It was pure joy!
Jen
Jul 11, 2008 at 11:42 am
The development of language and communication skills seem to be delayed rather than absent in our son- he started to point at objects a couple of months before he turned two, and started to speak at about three. And I’ve noticed with a bunch of skills, things just suddenly “click”. I think that it’s really interesting that the mutations are very specific to the individual, and that it some cases, it’s not so much that the gene is mutated as it’s turned off- maybe related to the whole epigenetics issue? That’s an area of biology that is not very well understood, and just now being explored. Also, it’s really great to read how well Charlie is doing with all the changes in routine this summer. How big of a change have you seen from last summer to now?
Melody
Jul 12, 2008 at 1:42 am
Ah, multi-step tasks (especially verbal). Yeah, I’d have a hard time with that. I usually need one at a time, or to see it written down and approach it one at a time. That’s one reason why I take so long to do science labs, and due to the chaos of other kids being around and talking and not co-operating, this has generally been my weak point in science, but since I took a college astronomy course, where the other students co-operated, and I’d gotten the instructions for the lab a week prior and so got to read them over and over again, I actually excelled at lab work (same effect in high school physics, chemistry, and biology when I get extra time to do the lab during lunch).
My dad is like this too, though he doesn’t have as much verbal or auditory processing difficulty, and it’s one reason why he doesn’t work cash registers at his retail jobs - not only all the noises and acting social around customers, but learning to operate it. That’s a thing that lots of people who don’t understand autism get: they think that if you can discuss things like physics or society, that things like operating a cash register should be easy, or that you should be able to learn it just from having someone verbally go over the steps. Both my dad and I need to actually DO the thing that’s being taught in order to remember it - just saying the instructions isn’t very effective.
When I was in first grade, I used to be kept in every recess to practice my printing, because apparently (though I didn’t understand at the time), my letters were not proportional, such as having a capital R being all below the dotted line, or having loops that are very small or very big, things like that. I couldn’t tell the difference, all that I knew was she was just getting frustratedly angry that I wasn’t copying it down in right proportions. Whatever being taught, and whichever method, showing frustration is definitely counter-productive. My dad doesn’t take that at work, and I certainly wouldn’t take it at school.
In fact, even years before I was diagnosed, my dad would come to my classes in early elementary school and help me out 1-on-1, which especially helped out with complicated multi-step art projects, and when we were learning money denominations (fortunately at that time my arithmetic was exceptional, quite the opposite from today, so I didn’t get hassled for that, though I did get hassled for not showing my work, even when I was the only one there and couldn’t possibly have cheated).
Norah
Jul 12, 2008 at 9:19 am
I was delayed in gross motor skills (never quite caught up either, so I guess it’s more than just delayed), don’t recall being delayed in fine motor skills, though I’m not that good (or just slower) at all of them (I recall always being last to finish with crafts and drawings in school :D).
My parents did help us (all 3 of us have trouble there) with gross motor skills by enrolling us for judo lessons and two of us also swimming lessons (beyond the standard swimming lessons everyone gets here in school).
My speech was not delayed (in fact it came on very early and kept developing early and language is something I have some talent for, though that does not mean I have no problems when it comes to language or speaking), and I interacted with my parents plenty enough as a baby. Interaction with peers: not so great (still isn’t :P). I have formed very few actual friendships in my life and only one of those was initiated by me.
I don’t take verbal instructions that well, written is better, but for a lot of things, I need to go through the motions to learn. I often don’t even look at manuals and such until much later when learning about some new programme or device: I just mess around with it and figure most of it out in my own tempo, then later look up the manual for tips and tricks I might have missed or more advanced stuff that can be hard to figure out on your own.
When it comes to learning things like language and history, visuals or text is easiest for me, and often I’ll just absorb it and then find out much later than I actually retained information, and it often needs a trigger to come back out or for me to even realise I know. If I’m extremely interested in something I tend to absorb and retain information right away, often even verbal information. Made good use of that and pointed my higher education in the direction of one of my interests.
Not a Team Player in the Office—-Not Necessarily
Jul 13, 2008 at 11:35 pm
[…] team teaching for my summer school on Psychology and Literature. My co-teacher and I have known each other for a few years but haven’t worked on any projects […]
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