As our children grow up my husband and I work hard at trying to balance what each of our children can and cannot handle. We want them to be as self sufficient as they can. So many people say my child can’t do this or my child can’t do that. To be honest, there were several things that our middle son can do that we never thought would be possible. In many cases children on the autism spectrum can do far more than we realize, they just may take more time to learn or a more non-traditional way of learning.
Baby Steps
The first step was establishing communication. All of our children had limited vocabulary (our youngest still does) until first grade. However up until that point we were still working on teaching them words, telling them what we were doing when doing things around the house, reading to them, playing games focusing on words, colors, numbers, shapes, basically anything to allow them to hear words.
Once the older boys were able to start talking this allowed us to gauge what they were understanding much easier. This allowed us to start giving them chores and to help them comprehend things that were confusing to them. We quickly determined that our oldest son could only handle simple instructions with 1-2 steps. Now he can handle up to 3-4 steps.
Every child is different. So while our oldest son can only handle a small amount of instructions, our middle son can handle pretty much any instructions we give him. However, we must make sure he is paying attention, otherwise he just guesses or thinks he did everything he was supposed to.
One thing we have found useful for both of our oldest sons is written reinforcement. We designed written chore lists (one for each of them) that we post on the refrigerator, breaking the chores down onto specific days. From this came designing calendars on the computer and placing tasks on there and allowing them to add their own. This is progressing them toward something they can use in their adult life. We have also worked with our middle son on note taking and tracking when assignments are due in school by writing them down into a notebook. We showed him several different methods and encouraged him to chose the one he preferred. We also let him know if that one didn’t work, that he might want to try another method and see if that worked better.
As each of our children masters one task we try to expand on that task or work on a new task, focusing on skills that would be useful to them in their adult life.
Safety
We can’t be with our children every second of every day, so safety is a big concern. From a young age we worked with our children to teach them about the dangers inside the house. We taught them to not touch sharp objects and to ask for help if you needed something cut. As they got older we taught them to cut with rounded scissors and after they mastered that, continued onto regular scissors. Our oldest is not careful enough to handle knives, so he doesn’t use them and asks for help cutting anything he can’t cut using his fork. Our middle son advanced to butter knives, moving into serrated blades and has his own pocket knife which he uses to open boxes. Each child has their limits, so we help them to move on to the safest option for each one individually based upon knowledge, skill, focus and comprehension.
We also worked on safety outside the house. We taught our oldest children to look before crossing the street (still working on this with our youngest) and cross holding a hand of an adult. Then we progressed onto crossing without holding a hand, moving onto crossing by themselves. Everything is a series of steps moving them toward being as self-sufficient as possible. We also encourage them to be aware of their surroundings. They look for things that could be a potential problem, such as strangers, loose animals not where they belong, cars acting strangely, triggers for their siblings, etc.
Next came preparing them for outside chores. We taught them how to watch for cars pulling into and out of our driveway. We taught them to not touch fuzzy caterpillars or snakes. For the first chore we introduced was weeding. We quickly discovered that our oldest couldn’t tell the difference between a weed and a plant, so he works in the areas away from the garden. Our middle son however advanced to helping around the garden and has moved onto trimming and mowing. These are skills our son can now use at his own place when he moves out or could potentially work for a landscaping/mowing company.
When the older kids started attending school, they rode a bus. At first we walked or drove them to the bus stop and waited with them for the bus to arrive. We would walk them up to the bus and waited for them to get on. As they got older we let them go up to the bus by themselves while we watched from the bus stop. A short time later, they able to go to the bus on their own. Although this momma bear still watches the oldest from the window when going down to catch the bus.
Encouraging, Not Holding Back
It’s in our nature to protect our kids, however this can sometimes make it harder for them. We try to push our children to reach their fullest potential. We encourage them to try new things and to work harder to achieve goals. Sometimes the goal is too hard. Rather than give up and say they can’t do it, try to break it down into smaller steps and then work toward that goal. Sometimes you’ve got to think outside the box.
And yes, sometimes there are things your child will never do. Our oldest will never do algebra, but he can do basic addition and subtraction and a little bit of multiplication and division. He knows the values of money and how to make change, however he doesn’t understand bank accounts and checkbooks. He can place an order at the restaurant and swipe his debit card. The key is getting them to the closest point to self-sufficiency. With someone to handle his finances, he can handle the day to day spending.
Our middle son has noise tolerance problems. Over time we have worked with him using headphones or ear plugs. When he was in middle school he wanted to play in his school’s band. At first we were skeptical about if he could do it, but we encouraged him to give it a try. He started out using ear plugs and eventually didn’t even need them. He struggled with the pep rallies due to the noise and chaos, so we did get permission to have him sit those out. Finding their limits is important, we want to encourage but not discourage. It was apparent that this was a task we did not have sufficient time to overcome, so we worked on making sure he could play at the games, concerts and parades. He was able to successful achieve these and enjoy them.
Don’t Tell Them That They Can’t Do Something
When our middle son was growing up, all he could talk about was driving. We were uncertain if he would ever be able to, but worked on getting him the necessary skills to be able to do so. We worked on keeping his focus and not becoming distracted. When we would drive we would talk about looking around your surroundings and searching for things that could be a problem when driving – speeding cars, four way stops, animals on the side of the road, etc. We worked on teaching him how to use the riding mower. Frequently we would discuss what we were doing while we were driving and would occasionally ask him questions about driving. When he mastered the mower, we gave him material to study for the drivers test and he got his learner’s permit.
On the other hand, our oldest heard a friend talking about going to college and knows that it is the next step for most students graduating from high school. He keeps talking about going to college. We know this is not possible for him. So what do we do? We had a conversation with him the other day about all the things people can do when they graduate high school. We mentioned that college is not for everyone and some people go out and find a job. We pointed out that his cousin didn’t go to college, but instead is working in a job she likes. We asked him if he would like to get a job. He agreed. So now he is getting ready to start job training and will hopefully find a job he likes.
Keep Looking Forward
The most important thing is to keep looking forward. Keep working toward that next goal to get them ready for the real world. All we can do is encourage them and help them acquire as many skills as we can to prepare them. By working step by step in tasks, we can help them to accomplish larger goals that can teach them life skills critical for their future.
