1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:11,680 Welcome to From the Spectrum podcast. This is a podcast about autism. It is my goal to explain 2 00:00:11,680 --> 00:00:20,360 what is autism. I plan to use a mixture of scientific literature, personal experience, 3 00:00:20,360 --> 00:00:31,440 and opinion. With opinion, I will explain why. I fill the way I do and give examples. I will 4 00:00:31,440 --> 00:00:39,120 provide links to various references for each episode. For each episode, we will discuss various 5 00:00:39,120 --> 00:00:47,600 aspects of autism. The From the Spectrum podcast will mostly avoid causes of autism, 6 00:00:47,600 --> 00:00:55,280 and I will try avoiding the increase of diagnoses of late. This is like playing tug-of-war with 7 00:00:55,280 --> 00:01:04,280 barbed wire, and I don't think I want to travel down that path. For today's episode, we will cover 8 00:01:04,280 --> 00:01:15,040 autism and education. Any conversation around education ought to be taken serious. The conversation 9 00:01:15,040 --> 00:01:26,400 about education is dangerous. It's touchy. Autism in education adds to the heated discussion. 10 00:01:26,400 --> 00:01:36,400 There is so much going on in education, even within a single school building. Many types, 11 00:01:36,400 --> 00:01:48,560 many differences with curriculum, learners, educators, corporations, staff members, rules, 12 00:01:48,560 --> 00:02:00,320 and regulations. With autism, autism will grab attention of those involved. Staff, for the 13 00:02:00,320 --> 00:02:12,520 most part, even educated staff on the topic, are uneducated. Education cannot and should not have 14 00:02:12,520 --> 00:02:23,960 much weight on their opinion. Undergraduate level to, well, all the way up the highest degree, 15 00:02:23,960 --> 00:02:34,640 some of this population needs to reconsider their involvement. In the show notes, I mentioned the 16 00:02:34,640 --> 00:02:44,960 podcast is for the lay public and professionals. Mostly in education, they are distributed 17 00:02:44,960 --> 00:02:54,440 somewhere in between. It is my goal for this episode that others involved with people with 18 00:02:54,440 --> 00:03:04,960 autism can receive further information so they can make informed decisions, either for themselves, 19 00:03:04,960 --> 00:03:15,920 or for their loved ones. Parents get hitched on their opinion, their meaning school staff. 20 00:03:15,920 --> 00:03:26,640 What's coming out of the school building? Which should count, but it needs to be considered. 21 00:03:26,640 --> 00:03:40,640 Their knowledge, their education, their experience of autism. Is it enough? And one, should consider 22 00:03:40,640 --> 00:03:51,520 the goal of the school is to have the child docile and behaving correctly to the school's definition. 23 00:03:51,520 --> 00:04:05,680 As much and as fast as possible and whatever is needed to make that happen. At times, humans 24 00:04:05,680 --> 00:04:17,360 have enough. They want solutions, answers, they want things taken care of. And to qualify my 25 00:04:17,360 --> 00:04:28,960 comments. Undergraduate level, teachers to support service type, or even master's level. Staff are 26 00:04:28,960 --> 00:04:43,040 not qualified to understand autism's full complexity. Few are. Now, I realize unless it is a school 27 00:04:43,040 --> 00:04:54,080 psychologist in which they should still be questioned, diagnosing autism does not come from here. 28 00:04:56,160 --> 00:05:05,520 It takes specialization, certain licenses, but more importantly experience and the ability to 29 00:05:05,520 --> 00:05:17,280 remove implicit biases. To quiet those when dealing with the other person, the person with autism, 30 00:05:18,000 --> 00:05:29,120 or the suspected autism. However, it only shows the vast and deeply rooted biases these adults 31 00:05:29,120 --> 00:05:41,200 will have. Remember, humans love to take control, feel like they are helping, and humans love to 32 00:05:41,200 --> 00:05:52,320 have their beliefs confirmed. Already, if you are in education, you probably have underlying 33 00:05:52,320 --> 00:06:03,280 wants or desires to help. Feel like you are providing something to the children or students 34 00:06:04,080 --> 00:06:14,400 and the parents. Further, you are in the school building handling these situations for long hours 35 00:06:14,400 --> 00:06:26,720 and enough could be enough. It feels good. It provides a sense of purpose and confirmation 36 00:06:26,720 --> 00:06:37,840 of competence, a relief in the job, and the daily duties. This opens up negative beliefs and worries 37 00:06:37,840 --> 00:06:47,440 for parents and guardians, and it is a good path, a reliable path for stuff, for treatments, 38 00:06:47,440 --> 00:06:57,680 for information to be misplaced or incorrect. And it provides a path for something common 39 00:06:57,680 --> 00:07:12,240 in our society. An appointment with PCP and one or more prescriptions. And that is hard to reverse. 40 00:07:13,520 --> 00:07:20,720 If anything, doses will increase or more prescriptions will be prescribed. 41 00:07:20,720 --> 00:07:33,280 As a side note, we'll just take a hard pause here. Go into your search bar and type in CAGR, 42 00:07:34,240 --> 00:07:44,960 Compound Annual Growth Rate. This is what that stands for. CAGR of Antipsychotics 43 00:07:44,960 --> 00:08:02,080 for 2023 to 2030. Society loves to prescribe medication. That is our first line of defense. 44 00:08:04,000 --> 00:08:11,200 Children and adults get prescribed antipsychotics, antidepressants, 45 00:08:11,200 --> 00:08:21,520 psychostimulants. We are giving these things to children to sit down, behave, and act right. 46 00:08:22,480 --> 00:08:33,600 Do what you're told. I think our era will be known as the overprescription era or the great 47 00:08:33,600 --> 00:08:44,640 prescription era or something along those lines. Psychostimulants and ADHD has a sharp increase. 48 00:08:46,640 --> 00:08:56,880 Hopefully, this will clean up closer to, let's say, 10 years from now than 100 years from now. 49 00:08:56,880 --> 00:09:08,480 Now, can we sustain this paradigm? You can search Rockefeller Medicine or Rockefeller 50 00:09:08,480 --> 00:09:19,920 and Medicine Men, Medicine and Capitalism. Further, the top revenue business types from 2023, 51 00:09:19,920 --> 00:09:30,240 three of the top five business types include Medicine and Health Care. These are all cleared 52 00:09:30,240 --> 00:09:40,240 profits revenue. That was a long turn from the school and staff not being educated for properly 53 00:09:40,240 --> 00:09:52,160 understanding what is autism. However, everything I just mentioned is directly involved with the 54 00:09:52,160 --> 00:10:04,880 situation. It is our first line, our first option. Similar to the health care rant and that not 55 00:10:04,880 --> 00:10:16,080 working, what we are doing in education is not working. Autism or not. The worst thing the 56 00:10:16,080 --> 00:10:26,800 government has done is not remove itself from education. They tried. They seemingly, seemingly 57 00:10:26,800 --> 00:10:41,840 failed. So next. Okay, the school day. Already, the structure of the school day conflicts with 58 00:10:41,840 --> 00:10:57,040 autism. The entire structure is completely opposite of autistic phenotypes. Both criteria A and B, 59 00:10:57,040 --> 00:11:04,080 the social communication and interaction and the repetitive restricted behaviors. 60 00:11:04,080 --> 00:11:18,160 Before we move on, maybe you need to know criteria B a little bit better. Please research what criteria 61 00:11:18,160 --> 00:11:29,680 B looks like. If you think it is odd or different type of behaviors, then you are evaluating it with 62 00:11:29,680 --> 00:11:39,920 limited critical thinking. Maybe you are offended because your capacity to think is limited. 63 00:11:41,600 --> 00:11:54,880 Maybe you view life through a narrow lens. And maybe that is easier. It limits the conflict, 64 00:11:54,880 --> 00:12:05,920 the agitation or frustration underlying learning. All types of learning. All forms of learning. 65 00:12:05,920 --> 00:12:16,160 When learning happens, there are underlying thoughts and feelings associated with agitation and 66 00:12:16,160 --> 00:12:30,160 frustration. And maybe you like to dismiss that consciously or unconsciously to return to a 67 00:12:30,160 --> 00:12:40,640 comfortable state. Remember something that keeps us within ourselves. Autism, something that keeps 68 00:12:40,640 --> 00:12:52,240 autistics within ourselves is the amount of possibilities and interest. Just enjoyment of those. 69 00:12:54,320 --> 00:13:04,560 Remember, are you even interesting? If no, in comparison to our fixated interest, if no, 70 00:13:04,560 --> 00:13:16,720 we are content with the incredible amount of thinking capacity we possess. Autism gives us 71 00:13:16,720 --> 00:13:27,440 the ability to be comfortable within ourselves. And this accelerates our abilities, our superpowers. 72 00:13:27,440 --> 00:13:37,680 Again, you can sum it up by, are you like the so called normal people or not? 73 00:13:39,600 --> 00:13:49,120 So, back to the school. The classroom typically involves 20 or so, sometimes more, sometimes less. 74 00:13:49,120 --> 00:13:59,440 But nowadays, people are not going into education and people are leaving education. Finding teachers, 75 00:14:00,080 --> 00:14:07,840 special needs teachers, especially, or just general education teachers is hard. 76 00:14:07,840 --> 00:14:21,840 So, 20 or so students to make it easy. Remember criteria A. The classroom requires a social 77 00:14:21,840 --> 00:14:31,840 dynamic, a speech and language dynamic, and of course, sensory processing dynamic. Three strikes. 78 00:14:31,840 --> 00:14:37,920 Three strikes against autism. And that is just criteria A. 79 00:14:40,160 --> 00:14:48,720 Next, the school day typically studies a single subject for 40 to 50 minutes or so, 80 00:14:48,720 --> 00:14:55,120 depending on the age, but typically 40 to 50 minutes and then switches. 81 00:14:55,120 --> 00:15:04,800 40 to 50 minutes on the next subject and switches and repeat all day. 82 00:15:06,640 --> 00:15:18,640 Criteria B. That's it. B3. Episode over. This is all you need to know about autism and education. 83 00:15:18,640 --> 00:15:30,160 Those are complete contrast to autism phenotypes. It does not work for us. 84 00:15:32,640 --> 00:15:40,720 The teacher, and this is not a shot at them. The teacher is seemingly best prepared, 85 00:15:40,720 --> 00:15:48,640 best suited to teach the masses, the general abilities of the students. 86 00:15:50,320 --> 00:15:59,440 Now, education has seemingly made strides to accommodate. I guess we can say things like 504s 87 00:16:00,080 --> 00:16:07,440 and IEPs, smaller class sizes, and scheduling breaks and so forth. 88 00:16:07,440 --> 00:16:17,120 A major consideration is each person involved has their own opinion, has their own expectation 89 00:16:17,120 --> 00:16:27,440 of how it should go, what the child needs or should do, or how the child should be treated, 90 00:16:27,440 --> 00:16:40,960 or act, and so on. And each individual involved has their own knowledge, sometimes or most times, 91 00:16:41,680 --> 00:16:55,520 a limited knowledge of what is autism. Higher education or any type of degree does not have 92 00:16:55,520 --> 00:17:04,320 a single autism specialty. You can't get a degree in autism. And even if you could, 93 00:17:05,280 --> 00:17:13,200 there's a saying about meeting a child with autism or an adult with autism, for that matter. 94 00:17:13,840 --> 00:17:21,040 If you've met one child with autism, you've met one child with autism. 95 00:17:21,040 --> 00:17:31,520 So, to break that down, because I'm not sure if you interpret that, each person with autism, 96 00:17:32,720 --> 00:17:42,560 each autistic has their own form, has their own problems, and superpowers associated with this 97 00:17:42,560 --> 00:17:57,280 phenomena. It's so unique. Okay, elementary school. In elementary, I had trouble reading and keeping 98 00:17:57,280 --> 00:18:06,640 up. It was the 80s, and I remember being put in a small group, three or four of us, with a teacher's 99 00:18:06,640 --> 00:18:16,080 aide. We would read short passages, short assignments of some sort, and come back together as a group 100 00:18:16,080 --> 00:18:25,920 to talk about it. The comprehension part. I remember sometimes the group was tasked to read it twice 101 00:18:25,920 --> 00:18:38,400 before discussing it. I always finished last. I learned to not read it, to pretend, and I would 102 00:18:38,400 --> 00:18:47,120 look around and say, I was finished after the group finished. Mrs. Blazy was the name of the 103 00:18:47,120 --> 00:18:56,880 teacher's aide. I remember one day on the playground, she taught us to say, thank you, and not thanks. 104 00:18:58,480 --> 00:19:07,600 Thanks doesn't have the same meaning. I remember she was handing out chocolate kisses. Back then, 105 00:19:07,600 --> 00:19:18,240 you could do this, and making the students say, thank you. Anyway, when reading in small groups, 106 00:19:18,960 --> 00:19:29,760 it was very stressful. For two reasons. I want to discuss two reasons on this. One, 107 00:19:29,760 --> 00:19:40,480 reading creates our visual thinking. The movie's being created in our heads. This adds time and a 108 00:19:40,480 --> 00:19:53,120 step. This creates delays. The visual thinking is captivating and required. This is common with 109 00:19:53,120 --> 00:20:02,720 autism. Remember Temple Grandin, Thinking and Pictures, three chapters two and three. In addition, 110 00:20:03,440 --> 00:20:12,480 Temple Grandin has a newer book out called Autism and Education, in which she discusses the reading 111 00:20:12,480 --> 00:20:25,280 to visual thinking, the visualization of what the context is, the content is, and how that delays and slows us down. 112 00:20:27,600 --> 00:20:34,880 Second thing is, do you even know when reading, we activate our speech and language? 113 00:20:34,880 --> 00:20:44,720 Speech and language process is an implicated and common problem with autism. I was in speech and 114 00:20:44,720 --> 00:20:54,640 language whenever I was a child. However, anyway, when reading, our speech and language silently 115 00:20:54,640 --> 00:21:06,560 speaks to our brain. We speak to ourselves silently to teach the brain. If you know about 116 00:21:06,560 --> 00:21:16,240 criteria A, and if you combine these two other factors, reading and comprehension, is difficult 117 00:21:16,240 --> 00:21:30,400 compared to others. Now, I just want to take a slight turn here and mention, now, imagine 118 00:21:31,120 --> 00:21:43,600 reading out loud. Imagine the difficulties now. That is extra steps, that is choppy and broken 119 00:21:43,600 --> 00:21:51,920 languages, that is reading the words, the text on the page, visualizing it, processing it through 120 00:21:51,920 --> 00:22:01,360 visualization, and then recruiting the speech and language to form, verbally speak, what is being read, 121 00:22:01,360 --> 00:22:15,120 then seen, out loud. I am 43, and just last semester, I butchered this. It was awkward, 122 00:22:15,760 --> 00:22:23,520 but I don't care, but it was strange for this to happen the first time in this cohort. 123 00:22:23,520 --> 00:22:33,520 Anyways, out of those two factors, both are driving forces against my abilities. 124 00:22:36,080 --> 00:22:43,520 I don't read much, because I can't keep up with it. It just takes me so long. 125 00:22:43,520 --> 00:22:53,360 However, I have other special techniques. I won't go into them in detail. We kind of 126 00:22:53,360 --> 00:23:02,320 touch on them from time to time, or mostly every episode, probably. But mostly, it involves the 127 00:23:02,320 --> 00:23:11,920 visual thinking and some patterns and anticipation. In fourth grade, I am thinking it was the fourth 128 00:23:11,920 --> 00:23:20,480 grade. It was not the third grade, because it wasn't Mrs. Miller or her classroom. And remember, 129 00:23:21,200 --> 00:23:27,680 that was my Vietnam War novel year. I am still in contact with Mrs. Miller. 130 00:23:29,280 --> 00:23:36,640 Anyway, the fourth grade, the class was sitting in a circle, and each student around the circle 131 00:23:36,640 --> 00:23:47,120 got the next letter of the alphabet. The student's task was easy. Name, five nouns for that letter. 132 00:23:48,960 --> 00:23:57,520 As we moved around the circle, early on, I counted. I tracked which letter I would get. 133 00:23:57,520 --> 00:24:10,960 I wanted, and I needed, to rehearse it. Amazingly, I was going to get S, same as my last name. 134 00:24:12,640 --> 00:24:20,480 In addition, the letters were across the top of the chalkboard. If you don't know what that is, 135 00:24:20,480 --> 00:24:30,480 a chalkboard, then search it. This was simple. Each letter had three pictures of the nouns for 136 00:24:30,480 --> 00:24:43,360 each letter. Each letter had three random pictures of nouns. S had sailboat, sailor, and school. 137 00:24:43,360 --> 00:24:48,720 I remember the picture, and the alphabet hung across the top of the chalkboard. 138 00:24:50,000 --> 00:24:57,680 I had four of the five nouns already, and I began rehearsing, speaking them to the class. 139 00:24:59,280 --> 00:25:10,240 Finally, it was my turn, and I said nothing. I just sat there. The teacher and students were shocked, 140 00:25:10,240 --> 00:25:19,760 and gave me something like, oh, you know it. They also started to encourage me. Like, come on, 141 00:25:19,760 --> 00:25:34,960 you can get it. This caused me to act like I didn't know the five. I acted like I was thinking. I was 142 00:25:34,960 --> 00:25:45,680 on it. But I wasn't. I just wasn't going to speak. Time's up. Not that there was a time limit, 143 00:25:46,240 --> 00:25:54,960 or anyone else experienced this. The teacher and students named five, and I awkwardly sat there. 144 00:25:54,960 --> 00:26:03,440 I cannot explain it. It was decades ago. It was the mid to late 80s. 145 00:26:05,520 --> 00:26:12,160 My troubles with education would continue, and only become more challenging each year. 146 00:26:14,080 --> 00:26:21,280 Today, I still have challenges with spelling and subject verb agreement. Now, I realize, 147 00:26:21,280 --> 00:26:32,000 subject verb agreement is not necessarily uncommon in society. Remember my comments on the English 148 00:26:32,000 --> 00:26:44,240 language. It's a little pretentious and lazy to me. I am unsure what came first. My struggles in school 149 00:26:44,240 --> 00:26:55,280 or giving up. But I had no confidence or trust I could do anything in school besides art. 150 00:26:57,600 --> 00:27:04,160 All levels of education, from elementary to high school, I excelled in art classes. 151 00:27:04,160 --> 00:27:16,320 Typically, typical brains go from general to detail. They look at the whole picture first. 152 00:27:17,920 --> 00:27:25,280 We see details, and not that that others don't. We go from detail to general. 153 00:27:27,120 --> 00:27:33,200 When I worked in an engineering department, we would call something like that reverse 154 00:27:33,200 --> 00:27:43,360 engineering. The slight details come first and come fast. I remember looking at pictures while 155 00:27:43,360 --> 00:27:52,320 doing the ADOS II mod 4 and just being caught on slight details of pictures whenever I was supposed 156 00:27:52,320 --> 00:28:03,200 to be moving along. In high school, I barely made it. Mentally, I quit. And physically, I nearly 157 00:28:03,200 --> 00:28:12,400 quit a couple of times. Quit school for good. I couldn't keep up in class. And with each class, 158 00:28:12,400 --> 00:28:23,360 those generalized class requirements. And in that environment. In high school, I changed schools. 159 00:28:23,360 --> 00:28:32,640 Then I changed back. But I had to do an alternative school first. Pathways to success. 160 00:28:32,640 --> 00:28:42,240 The alternative school was my senior year. And it was known I might not have enough credits 161 00:28:42,240 --> 00:28:50,480 to graduate. Alternative school was the first time in a long time. I thought I could do it. 162 00:28:52,240 --> 00:29:00,000 Pathways to success lasted through the beginning of the second semester of my senior year. 163 00:29:01,200 --> 00:29:09,120 So it was close. One objective is proving I could do general education classrooms. 164 00:29:09,120 --> 00:29:17,840 Prepping me to return to those classrooms. Alternative school was a small class. We had four to five 165 00:29:17,840 --> 00:29:30,240 students. It was slow paced, reduced subjects, one teacher, and a quiet classroom. It was great for me. 166 00:29:30,240 --> 00:29:41,200 Then I was integrated back into the general classroom. General classrooms. 167 00:29:42,480 --> 00:29:50,880 My troubles returned. On paper. And on record, official record. I did make it. 168 00:29:50,880 --> 00:29:58,080 At the end of the semester, my senior year, teachers would call students up to review their grade. 169 00:29:58,080 --> 00:30:07,920 This was standard. It was the old great books. Nothing electronic. Students name listed in rows. 170 00:30:07,920 --> 00:30:16,480 Assignments listed in columns at the top. And scores listed across the row. With accumulated scores 171 00:30:16,480 --> 00:30:33,360 at the end. A newer male teacher called me up. 58%. And asked me, you might not graduate, right? 172 00:30:35,840 --> 00:30:43,280 How does that make you feel? I didn't know. And after a long pause of looking at the 58%, 173 00:30:43,280 --> 00:30:52,480 I honestly did not know. Eventually I answered back. I don't know. 174 00:30:54,480 --> 00:31:02,560 Later I found out when the final grades were handed out on the paper grades, the report cards. 175 00:31:02,560 --> 00:31:17,200 Nothing electronic. The grade was changed to a 62.5%. A D minus is the letter grade I have 176 00:31:17,200 --> 00:31:26,400 on that report card. I have my high school transcripts because of everything we're discussing today. 177 00:31:26,400 --> 00:31:39,440 As a reminder of what occurred to me. It's not an excuse. It's just reality. 178 00:31:40,880 --> 00:31:50,240 And at the time, the male teacher called me up and showed me the 58%. Assignments and grades 179 00:31:50,240 --> 00:32:03,200 were finished. And that year, earlier in the year, it was mid second semester. I took it late. 180 00:32:03,200 --> 00:32:14,640 I took the SAT. A component of the education plan for me was preparing me for post graduation. 181 00:32:14,640 --> 00:32:28,720 Either an unbelievable path to applying to colleges or different employment options. 182 00:32:28,720 --> 00:32:48,080 So they had me take the SAT. I scored a 640 on the SAT. 640. A part of the autism assessment 183 00:32:48,080 --> 00:32:56,320 is a full psychological assessment. I have scores and abilities from this assessment 184 00:32:56,320 --> 00:33:03,600 that puts me into very superior ranges relative to the population comparisons. 185 00:33:05,760 --> 00:33:16,880 Very superior. High averages to very superior on many different items. And some abilities or 186 00:33:16,880 --> 00:33:28,000 inabilities that are low average to extremely low or words like impaired or severe ranges. 187 00:33:29,440 --> 00:33:40,240 We have superpowers and super deficits. How is how are the schools and the educators supposed 188 00:33:40,240 --> 00:33:52,000 to facilitate each one of these? So the child, the student can excel in these environments. 189 00:33:52,960 --> 00:34:01,440 It doesn't seem fair to either one. Some of my superpowers from the assessment, 190 00:34:02,320 --> 00:34:08,800 high average to very superior includes processing speeds. Remember the rate of information. 191 00:34:08,800 --> 00:34:16,400 The sensory processing phenomena. The fire hose of information as Diceroth called it. 192 00:34:17,440 --> 00:34:27,440 That EI conversation. Know that in some environments, in some context, this is superior. 193 00:34:27,440 --> 00:34:35,440 This is a superpower. This is better than most of society. But in some environments, 194 00:34:35,440 --> 00:34:43,600 it is a super deficit. Struggled. I cannot be in those environments. Understand that. 195 00:34:45,280 --> 00:34:53,920 Also, visual reproduction. Remember the details first. A test called trail making. 196 00:34:53,920 --> 00:35:06,080 I received high average to superior in processes like scanning, sequencing and switching speeds. 197 00:35:07,840 --> 00:35:18,880 Remember autism has rigid thinking. B3. So rules are rules. Mostly as long as they are clear to us. 198 00:35:18,880 --> 00:35:29,920 We define a clear rule set and we do that. That is one of the jobs of the proof frontal cortex. 199 00:35:30,720 --> 00:35:39,200 Understanding rule sets. And then recruiting. What is necessary? Remember that activating 200 00:35:39,200 --> 00:35:51,040 and inactivating things. Also, organization and planning on the CEPI test was very high. 201 00:35:52,080 --> 00:36:00,400 Superior. I forget the language used for that test. And then some super deficits include 202 00:36:00,400 --> 00:36:09,520 working memory. Remember the keeping up that processing. Some information into visualization. 203 00:36:10,400 --> 00:36:14,880 This complicates our short term or that working memory. 204 00:36:17,840 --> 00:36:27,440 General adaptiveness. Conceptualizing. And of course, socialness and leisure are severe. 205 00:36:27,440 --> 00:36:40,160 The outside world is chaotic. Generally speaking, education is arranged around the middle, the average. 206 00:36:41,040 --> 00:36:51,040 This is where the majority of the population falls. And one final conveyance of some troubles that I have 207 00:36:51,040 --> 00:37:03,040 and other students out there will probably have too. And you can make sense of this with the biological factors and the processing complications we've discussed today. 208 00:37:05,040 --> 00:37:17,040 Taking notes in the classroom. I cannot take notes. Remember the challenges with spelling and visualizing the content. 209 00:37:17,040 --> 00:37:27,040 And my penmanship is awful, which hurts this. Spelling and the penmanship are kind of indirect forces here. 210 00:37:29,040 --> 00:37:37,040 But keeping up with listening and understanding the information being conveyed and writing them down. 211 00:37:37,040 --> 00:37:45,040 I cannot keep up with that. I cannot do it. However, some of those other superpowers that we have discussed. 212 00:37:45,040 --> 00:37:55,040 Supplements that. So I don't need to do the note taking like the typical students do. 213 00:37:55,040 --> 00:38:07,040 I've mentioned that I started a higher education grad school program recently. And before I started, I made a goal of keeping notes. 214 00:38:07,040 --> 00:38:21,040 That way I can keep up with the class and because I anticipated some troubles with this. So I made a goal. I really deliberately worked at trying to keep notes. 215 00:38:21,040 --> 00:38:31,040 Well, that did not last and I did not fight it because I wasn't going to change it. I just stopped taking the notes. 216 00:38:31,040 --> 00:38:41,040 Now in stats class, I could I could write down some formulas that were important, but anything else, I could not. 217 00:38:41,040 --> 00:38:54,040 Now I just typically watch people take notes and learn that how amazing it is. I'm constantly amazed by watching them take notes. 218 00:38:54,040 --> 00:39:02,040 However, with those other superpowers, I have not failed or it has not hurt me one bit. 219 00:39:02,040 --> 00:39:16,040 So I am thankful for that. I am thankful for our superpowers, our sensory processing and visual thinking. It is a strong use. 220 00:39:16,040 --> 00:39:26,040 As we wrap up today, I hope you learned something about what it's like for someone with autism navigating the education system. 221 00:39:26,040 --> 00:39:36,040 Regardless of a young child to all the way up to an adult in grad school, problems are across the board. 222 00:39:36,040 --> 00:39:52,040 Each stop, each level, there are massive amounts of problems. However, there are techniques and differences that can be utilized that can serve the autism with great benefits. 223 00:39:52,040 --> 00:40:03,040 This is the direction, the focus that I hope others can take, recognize and take. 224 00:40:03,040 --> 00:40:12,040 Don't try to change someone with autism because they are different than you. 225 00:40:12,040 --> 00:40:21,040 If you are listening and enjoy the episode or enjoy the podcast, please feel free to leave a review or rating. 226 00:40:21,040 --> 00:40:32,040 In podcasting, reviews, ratings and downloads are huge. And I very much appreciate your feedback. 227 00:40:32,040 --> 00:40:46,040 If you would like to contact me, please email at info.fromthespectrum.com. 228 00:40:46,040 --> 00:41:03,040 Thank you for listening to From the Spectrum Podcast.