Technology and autism

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/technology/personal-tech/apple/for-autistic-kids-idevices-are-life-changers/article1530164/

When you enter Emily Buczek’s Toronto classroom, it’s like Times Square: Everywhere you look, there’s a new visual distraction.

A picture of each student is tacked onto a large, colourful map above his or her country of origin (Emily’s mug hovers over Poland).

There’s a shelf of well-loved toys – a slumped-over clown, a plush frog – and rows of picture books, among them Emily’s favourite: a cardboard volume of Winnie-the-Pooh stories.

All these diversions are there to keep up with students’ fleeting attention spans: Emily and her peers at Beverley School all have developmental and/or physical disabilities.

Emily, a profoundly autistic 13-year-old with an overgrown pixie cut and fingernails that have been cut or chewed to the quick, doesn’t fit the stereotype of an early adopter of the iPad.

But parents and educators of children with developmental disabilities – particularly autism spectrum disorders (ASD) – have celebrated its release. While the device was created mostly for media consumption, it has plenty of surprising uses for children with such disabilities.

Emily doesn’t have an iPad in her hands yet, but the learning curve won’t be very steep when it’s released in Canada at the end of the month – she’s already mastered the iPod Touch at school and at home.

It’s been a godsend, her mother Christina says. With an autistic child, even the simplest tasks can be emotionally and physically draining.

She recalls many days when Emily, who is mostly non-verbal, indicated she wanted to go shopping – but wouldn’t say where.

“I’d be driving her toward one store and pulling in and she’d be really upset because it wasn’t the one she wanted,” she says. “It’s wasting a lot of time, it’s a lot of frustration.”

But then she downloaded the iConverse app on Emily’s iPod Touch. One of many assisted communication programs available for people with disabilities, it allowed Ms. Buczek to load photos of her daughter’s favourite stores, set to audio recordings of their names. Now all Emily has to do is run the app and click on the button that corresponds with her choice.

While Apple has not yet revealed Canadian prices for the iPad (it starts at $500 in the U.S.), Ms. Buczek says a price tag of even several hundred dollars would be significantly cheaper (not to mention more portable) than some of the assisted communication devices currently on the market, which can cost more than $10,000.

Emily, like many kids with ASD, struggles with her fine motor skills, and a larger screen would help her navigate the apps with greater precision, Ms. Buczek says.

At Emily’s school, six teachers are using the iPod Touch with their developmentally-disabled students, as part of a University of Toronto study led by faculty of information professor Rhonda McEwen. Professor McEwen wants to see how it can help them communicate.

So far, their greatest use is easing anxiety among students, says Emily’s teacher, Ian Stuart.

The iPod Touch that he uses with his class has been outfitted with speakers.

“Touch the bee,” says a tinny female voice in one app. Displayed on the screen is a chocolate bunny, a bee and a shopping cart. Emily’s hooked index finger hovers over all three options before it presses down on the bee.

Mr. Stuart frequently uses apps like this to help Emily focus before she moves on to a new activity in class, since transitions can be very difficult for kids with ASD.

There’s a stack of deep blue one-inch binders in his classroom that are collecting dust. Before, whenever he’d head out with his students, he’d have to bring them along.

Inside each binder are pages of picture cards arranged in various sequences. A picture of a ball and swing followed by a computer means recess is followed by computer time.

Since Mr. Stuart has used the iPod Touch, he’s done away with the binders. All those sequences can be stored in apps on the device, which has become a magic wand of sorts.

“[When we transition], some won’t even look at me,” he says. “But then I’ll pull out the iPod and when they look at it and hear sounds it’s like an epiphany.”

Software developers who enjoyed success with accessibility apps for the iPhone and iPod Touchhave now focused their attention on the iPad.

The latest version of Proloquo2Go, the most popular AAC app in the iTunes store, was released at the start of the month to work on the iPad. As of Friday, it was ranked No. 34 overall in the United States among all 185,000-plus apps.

It can be used by people with disabilities – particularly non-verbal ones, many of whom have strong visual memories – to express their wants and needs.

“It’s just a game changer,” Samuel Sennott, co-creator of the app, says of the iPad. “It’s … [a] portable, table-top solution for people with physical impairments, people with visual impairments. You can see more on the screen.”

For Stacie Carroll, another teacher at Beverley School, there’s another perk to using these gadgets with students: “It’s the cool factor,” she says.

“This is their world. They pick up a cell [phone] and they know what to do with it.”

Whether they’re using an iDevice for scheduling, learning or easing anxiety, the key is that they blend in with other kids, she says.

She uses eight apps regularly with her students, including a few unusual ones. She shows off iSeismo, which graphs even the slightest movements. She’s used it teach her class – a rather fidgety bunch – how to sit still and control their body movements.

Both she and Mr. Stuart say they see great potential in their classrooms for the iPad and its larger interface.

“A camera on [the iPad] would make it nearly perfect,” Ms. Carroll says.

Anissa Hersh, a speech-language pathologist on the ASD team at the Hamilton-Wentworth District School Board in Hamilton, says she’s interested in seeing how the device might benefit the students she works with as well.

“You have a whole generation of adults now who were never taught independence,” Ms. Hersh says. “If you have this technology, and know how to use it, the idea is that down the road, [they] can use it in their work field.”

Alex Stephens’s five-year-old son Luc has ASD and is “completely infatuated with computers,” he says. He’s an expert with his father’s iPhone, which works as both an entertainment device and an educational tool.

Mr. Stephens can barely keep up with all the unanticipated expenses that come with his son’s disability: special vitamins, speech therapy and social therapy.

At the moment, an iPad is a luxury he can’t afford, he says. “But if I were convinced it would help Luc, I’d buy it in a heartbeat.”

End of article

My "hair trigger" effect

http://pagingdrgupta.blogs.cnn.com/2010/04/07/ultra-sensitive-its-in-your-brain/?hpt=T2

Ultra-sensitive? Its in your brain.

By Elizabeth Landau
CNN.com Health Writer/Producer

If you are particularly sensitive to the world around you - whether it's music, caffeine, other people's emotions, you may have a personality trait called "sensory processing sensitivity."

People who are highly sensitive in this way tend to look and observe and process things deeply, as opposed to boldly going ahead, says Elaine Aron, professor of psychology at Stony Brook University, who helped pioneer research on the subject in the 1990s. Having vivid dreams and being aware of subtleties in your environment are also characteristic of this temperament, she said. Take this quiz to see if this fits you.

Now, Aron's group has shown evidence in the brain that these people are more detail-oriented. The study is published in the journal Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience.

Researchers used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to look at the brains of 18 participants. They found that people with sensory processing sensitivity tended to have more brain activity in the high-order visual processing regions, and in the right cerebellum, when detecting minor details of photographs presented to them.

"They are better at noticing subtle details in their environments than people without the trait," said Jadzia Jagiellowicz, lead author and doctoral candidate in the department of psychology at Stony Brook University.

Sensory processing sensitivity has been associated with introversion, but only loosely - about 30 percent of highly sensitive people are extroverts, Aron said.

Highly sensitive people probably make good counselors and recruiters, said Jagiellowicz, because of their attention to detail. They are able to more deeply process details as well as emotions, which are good skills in these professions. Accounting, which requires taking in a lot of information at once, may also be a relevant field, she said.

But the study showed that highly sensitive people do not quickly take in these details; in fact, they spend more time looking at them, so a job that requires a quick assessment of minutiae may not be the best fit, she said.

End of article

My comments: This article confirms what I finally figured out a few months ago. I'm simply wired differently. Its not my fault and I don't think I can fix it, but I can work on my reactions to the stimuli.

I can't remember a time when I haven't been on a "hair trigger." I've always been super sensitive. You look at me wrong and I feel like crying (and often do). Loud noises freak me out. I have a severe weather phobia. I have never reacted well to change. I worry obsessively.

But I'm working on all of this. I'm not autistic, but I can understand how scary changes in routine are to someone with autism. I used to be a slave to routine. I'm endeavoring to be more spontaneous. I'm finding that change can be exciting. I'm learning to roll with life.

"In three words I can sum up everything I've learned about life. IT GOES ON."
Robert Frost

librarianintx

Glee cast on "Oprah"

This was a question from the audience that didn't air on the show:

Q: "For me it's refreshing to see someone who's not able-bodied, as it were, on TV. I'm curious about the reaction you've gotten from viewers in terms of your character [Artie]."

Kevin McHale (Artie): "I'll reference a story that happened last weekend. A woman came up to me and she was saying her 16-year-old son is in a wheelchair, and he became obsessed with the show. She's like, 'I started reading books after the 10th time [he watched] the pilot episode, because I was over it. ... Me being the mom, I couldn't figure out why he liked the show so much.' It was the first time that her 16-year-old son had seen somebody in a wheelchair, representing his people, on TV. He'd watch the show and be like: 'That's my boy. That's my boy.' That right there, that's what it's all about. We are all playing somebody that somebody can relate to, and it's great. I'm so honored and proud to play that part. And they do an incredible job writing it, and it's just fun to sit back and do what they say."

I am very proud to say I am a "Gleek." I have been a fan of the show since I saw the first commercial for it. I love everything about it...the humor, the fun, the singing, the dancing, the heart, and of course the message...that its okay to be different, that everyone is different in their own way, and when we celebrate our differences, we often find our commonalities. I think just about everyone who watches the show can find a character they relate to, and that's one reason why the show is beloved by people ages seven to seventy.

I think all the characters are great, I have a very healthy crush on Mr. Shu, but my favorites are Artie and Kurt. Even though I did not start using a mobility device until I was in college, and even then I didn't use it all the time, I still feel such a connection to Artie. I am so proud of the show every time I see Artie front and center in the choreography, moving around the stage like everyone else in the choir, including participating in partner dancing. I love the fact even though he's not considered one of the "hunks" of the show, he is arguably one of the strongest male singers in the cast, and receives more than his share of the solos. It is so important having a major character with a disability in such a popular show. Its important for people with disabilties to see someone they can relate to, and its important for able-bodied people to see a portrayal of a healthy, active, intelligent, creative, talented person with a disability. No, the actor who plays Artie does not have a disability, and yes, I wish the show would have hired an actor with a disability. But Kevin McHale does a terrific job.

The character of Kurt, played by the talented Chris Colfer, is another important character to have on this popular show. Kurt is a proud, strong, confident gay young man, and arguably the most popular student in the choir. He steals every scene he's in, whether it be with a wink, a snappy one liner, or his incredible voice. The scenes with his widowed father are groundbreaking, whether his father is fighting for his son to have the opportunity to sing the usually female solo in a performance, or Kurt is saying he needs to remove his designer sweater before he lends a hand at his dad's auto repair shop. Kurt even joined the football team for a short time as the kicker.

Its important for 16 year olds and 42 year olds, and everyone in between, with and without a disability, to see someone like Artie on their tv screens. And its important for 16 year olds and 42 year olds, and everyone in between, gay and straight, to see someone like Kurt on their tv screens.

None of these characters are stereotypical. They have been created and are portrayed week after week in the way that reminds me of the famous quote from the movie "The Breakfast Club": "But what we found out is that each one of us is a brain...and an athlete...and a basket case...a princess...and a criminal."

librarianintx