Autism

I watched a short documentary about Autism that featured Temple Grandin talking about her experiences with Autism. It is an old movie, produced in 1992. They didn't use people-first language. They used terms like "autistics" and "mentally retarded." They also highlighted the lives of three other people.

One was a little girl who was in a form of Intensive Behavioral Intervention who was showing good signs of improvement. Another kiddo with autism was 16 years old when the video was made. He didn't have very much verbal skills but are working on getting him to talk more. He has a very supportive family that helps him out a lot. He was reverse mainstreamed meaning that regular-ed students came into his classroom to work with him.

The last was an older gentleman who types out his thoughts on a little processor. He is severely disabled but they found that he is very able to communicate with this device. He has a trainer that helps him use the machine at work. His mother had been told that he should be in an institution and now he is holding down a job in a local warehouse. There was another man that used the same device and has shown high intelligence.

This was a good video because we sometimes think that people with autism don't have high intelligence but often they do. There are some that do have low intelligence but we shouldn't treat everyone with autism like they have below normal IQ's. This will help me in my career since I hope to work with people with autism.