Thinking in Pictures: Film Camp for Autistic Children
“‘Art gives them a voice that they don’t have,’” says Joey Travolta, former special education teacher and the creator of Joey Travolta Entertainment Experience, a two-week long film camp for autistic children aged 10-18. The camp is being held at Oakland University in Rochester, Michigan, as reported in an article in today’s Detroit News online. The students are producing a 15-minute spoof of “The Apprentice” that will be screened on Saturday; the camp is funded by the Jack’s Place for Autism Foundation.
The film camp gives a new twist to the notion of “thinking in pictures.”
7 opinions for Thinking in Pictures: Film Camp for Autistic Children
Jannalou
Aug 14, 2006 at 10:31 am
The 11yo kid I do respite with on Saturday afternoons went to regular film camp a few weeks ago and excelled. Everyone wanted him in their movies, and so he did a lot of acting - this came after his drama camp (also a regular day camp). He enjoyed all of it immensely; his mother said he seems to like editing and directing more than writing.
(By ‘regular’ I mean that he was the only child there with special needs - well, there was a girl at film camp who probably should have been dx’d, I guess, but she wasn’t.)
Kristina Chew, PhD
Aug 14, 2006 at 11:52 am
I met a woman who is getting her doctorate at UC Berkeley who has started a film-makin project for autistic kids. Did the child you did respite with use the camera, too?
Jannalou
Aug 14, 2006 at 12:11 pm
I don’t know if he got to do any filming. They were put into pairs and then they wrote short films together, did the staging, filmed them, and edited them. He liked the technical stuff best according to his mom. I didn’t get to see any of the results, but I’m sure they were hilarious. (Most of the kids did Law & Order/CSI type shows, and ‘mine’ was everything from the bad guy to the dude who got killed to an innocent suspect.)
Kristina Chew, PhD
Aug 14, 2006 at 5:50 pm
Did they choose to do the crime-type shows? Something else to look into for Charlie.
Jannalou
Aug 14, 2006 at 9:01 pm
Yeah, the kids were all around the same age - 11 & 12, maybe a little older but not more than 14, tops. “Crime” seems to be “in” these days.
Phil Schwarz
Aug 14, 2006 at 10:54 pm
Wow, this is great, and within half an hour’s drive of Jeremy’s Opa’s house. (Jeremy’s Opa is my dad, and the house is the one I grew up in :-).)
Are they doing this program in future years? Whom can I contact about it?
(Off to read the Detroit News article to see if there’s contact info or at least contact info for the reporter…)
Kristina Chew, PhD
Aug 15, 2006 at 5:49 am
There’s contact info here—–
http://www.jacksplaceforautism.com/
Let us know if Jeremy does the camp!
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