Vision Education Facilitators support schools and teachers by providing PLD that deliberately assists staff to adapt their practice to support the achievement of students with high needs.
Some of the characteristics of effective practice for students who require learning support are listed on the Inclusive Practice page.
Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) describes a range of conditions that includes autism and Asperger syndrome.
People with ASD have a delay or difficulty in three areas of development:
- Language – they have difficulty understanding and using spoken language and non-verbal communication such as facial expressions and body language.
- Social – they have difficulty understanding social interactions. which impacts on their relationships with others.
- Thinking – they have difficulty thinking and behaving flexibly. They often engage in restricted, obsessive or repetitive behaviours.
A person with ASD will have a delay or difficulty in all three of these areas of development.
Every person with ASD is different as they have a range of difficulties to varying degrees in different areas.
They might have:
- severe problems in each area
- mild problems in each area
- more difficulty in one or two areas.
These difficulties will vary as they age. They also depend on factors such as their gender, personality, family and cultural circumstances, and intellectual ability.
Many children with ASD under- or over-react to sensory information which is another reason for differences amongst people with ASD. Some people can react in an over-responsive way while others react in an under-responsive way. Those with ASD may also seek out a sensory sensation.
Responses to sensory input can be highly inconsistent and vary from day to day. There are many factors that influence the way a person with ASD reacts to sensory information including time of day, energy levels, stress or a combination of factors. The category of sensory information that is causing difficulty can also be different for each person. We smell, touch, hear, see and taste as our five senses respond and adapt to external stimuli. We also respond to information received inside our bodies – from the tactile, vestibular and proprioceptive systems.