Growing Children

Littlenellie, I read the link and I think the Mark Church stuff is interesting, though, of course there are no miracle cures. I used to work a lot with dyslexic and dyspraxic children and a lot of people used to think that rhythm, pattern and movement were all very significant in development. It was around the time that country dancing went out of favour in primary schools and some of us thought that the complex patterns in those dances were helpful to some of our children with learning difficulties (even though they may have hated doing it!) My grandson loves dancing and goes to a theatre group, but I am not sure how structured the dancing is.

I think most people would say that autism involves the triad of impairments of communication, social behaviour and repetitive behaviour, but is also very much a syndrome with a huge range of manifestations. My grandson is considered atypical because he likes to try and make friends, but lacks the skills to do so. I also think that his development is complicated by bilingualism (they are a bilingual family and you can't change that), but I can't find much research on the impact of that. My DiL went to a lecture recently where they said they are looking at the impact of stress hormones in the womb, as well as the genetic component. They also said that they think it is much more common in girls than was previously thought, but it often goes undiagnosed.
I agree, Mishap, I wasn't at all sure about the two little boys at the end of the programme, but I guess it is hard to see the whole picture from the bit we were shown.
In terms of how it is dealt with in society, my grandson gets no support at all in school in Spain, despite having an official diagnosis from the psychiatrists and neurologists in the local hospital. He has a private therapist who is very good, though.

Oh, I do hope so, giltabo!

Mishap I find your comment about people looking back in a hundred years time to find our understanding of autism primitive is very interesting and to the point.
It is no so long ago that children with cerebral palsy in this country were hidden away in back rooms and not taken out or schooled. In the mid sixties I worked in the first day school in England for children with cerebral palsy. This school was funded by Paul Cadbury because has a cerebral palsied daughter. At this time, children with severe learning difficulties were not considered educable and were often put in institutions with adults with mental health problems.
Our understanding of these children has increased greatly since then and it seems inconceivable that these children were shunned by British society as recently as within my working life, but they were.
So I believe that we will learn more about autism and that these children will have better life chances and be enabled to live their lives fully and with dignity.

The autism programme made me think that one day, in a hundred years' time, people will look at this film and think how primitive our understanding of autistic spectrum disorder is.

The 3 young people shown were worlds apart in their symptoms and it was hard to relate it all to one disorder, especially as there is no hard science to connect them - there was a young man who had no speech or normal communication and severe learning disabilties; a highly intelligent and articulate male student who had difficulty reading others' emotions; and two primary age brothers who had an assortment of problems including lack of temper control, inability to deal with change etc. They gave no convincing scientific evidence of why these 3 very different presentations are part of the same problem.

I am sure that research into genetics will finally unlock the key to all this. In the meantime the help offered to sufferers and their families will inevitably be substandard. I have a nephew who suffers - and believe me his family suffer too.

I attended an interesting workshop on autism for a voluntary organisation I was working for recently,the session I found really interesting,although I have nothing to compare the research with suggests that Autism can be treated by a specific set of exercises,and a practitioner specially trained can treat the patient with "Rythmic movement and brain gym"
This seems to involve the inborn reflexes and movement patterns,sorry I dontknow how to link this but if you are interested the presenter was Mark Church who is an Instructor in this method and you can google him oN
WWW.markchurchcentre.co.uk..see what younthink

The OCD road Mamie. We must head him off, though I'm not the person to do it!

Sorry Jingle, can't see which way your GS is heading as the i-player link isn't available for us here. My grandson is on the autistic spectrum, though. I found some of it interesting, but I agree that some of the explanation of the science was a bit rushed / confused.

Yes! must watch this one

Thanks Mamie. (Think GS could be heading this way - like me )

Can you get BBC4 on I-player? Sounds interesting.

I have watched both programmes and to be honest I thought they were a bit lightweight - not enough science and too much voyeurism maybe? I would be interested in what others thought too.