Early Signs of Autism Risk

Early Signs of Autism Risk
The following signs may indicate a child is at risk for atypical development and is in need of an evaluation, according to First Signs, a group promoting early diagnosis of developmental disorders.



No big smiles or other warm, joyful expressions by 6 months or later

No back-and-forth sharing of sounds, smiles, or other facial expressions by 9 months or thereafter

No babbling by 12 months

No back-and-forth gestures, such as pointing, showing, reaching, or waving by 12 months

No words by 16 months

No two-word meaningful phrases (without imitating or repeating) by 24 months

Any loss of speech, babbling, or social skills at any age



Peg Rosen, a mother of two, is a writer in Montclair, New Jersey.

Originally published in American Baby magazine, January 2005.
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Five distinct areas of development are flagged for consideration. All parents should consider these "Big Five" if they suspect that their child may have autism.

1) Does the baby respond to his or her name when called by the caregiver? Within the first few months of life, babies respond to their own name by orienting toward the person who called them. Typical babies are very responsive to the voices of familiar people, and often respond with smiles and looks.

In contrast, infants later diagnosed with autism often fail to respond to their own name. That is, when called by name, they tend to turn and look at the person only about 20% of the time as found- in the videotaped one year-old birthday parties of children with autism. They also are often selectively responsive to sounds. They may ignore some sounds and respond to others that are of the same loudness. Thus, they may fail to respond to their parent calling their name, but immediately respond to the television being turned on. It is not unusual for parents to suspect their child has a hearing loss.

2) Does the young child engage in "joint attention"? Near the end of the first year of life, most infants begin to join with their caregivers in looking at the same object or event. To aid in this process of "joint attention", typical infants begin to shift their gaze from toys to people, follow other's points, monitor the gaze of others, point to objects or events to share interest, and show toys to others. These behaviors have a distinct sharing quality to them. For example, the young infant may point to an airplane flying over head, and look to the parent, as if to say, "do you see that!"

In contrast, young children with autism have particular difficulties in jointly attending with others. They rarely follow another's points, do not often shift their gaze back and forth from objects to people, and do not seem to share "being with" the caregiver as they watch and talk about objects, people, or events. They also tend not to "show" a toy to the parent.

3) Does the child imitate others? Typical infants are mimics. Very young infants can imitate facial movements (e.g., sticking out their tongue). As early as 8-10 months, mothers and infants say the same sounds one after another, or clap or make other movements. Indeed, imitation is a major part of such common infant games as pat-a-cake and So Big ("How big is baby? Soooo big!" as infant raises hands to sky).

Young children with autism, however, less often imitate others. They show less imitation of body and facial movements (waving, making faces, playing infant games), and less imitation with objects.

4) Does the child respond emotionally to others? Typical infants are socially responsive to others. They smile when others smile at them, and they initiate smiles and laughs when playing with toys and others. When typical infants observe another child crying, they may cry themselves, or looked concerned. Somewhat older infants may crawl near the person, pat, or in other ways offer comfort. These latter behaviors are suggestive of empathy and are commonly observed among children in the second year of life.

In contrast, children with autism may seem unaware of the emotions of others. They may not take notice of the social smiles of others, and thus may not look and smile in response to other's smiles. They also may ignore the distress of others. Several researchers have now shown that when an adult feigns pain and distress after hitting herself with a toy, or banging her knee, young children with autism are less likely to look at the adult, or show facial concern.

5) Does the baby engage in pretend play? Someone once noted that "play is the work of children." Young children love to pretend-to be a mother, father, or baby, to be a firefighter or police officer. Although children start to play with toys around six months or so, play does not take on a pretend quality until the end of the first year. Their first actions may involve pretending to feed themselves, their mother or a doll, brush the doll's hair, or wipe the doll's nose. Nearer their second birthday, children engage in truly imaginative play as dolls may take on human qualities of talking or engaging in household routines. Children may pretend that a sponge is a piece of food, a block is a hat, or a plastic bowl is a swimming pool that contains water.

In contrast, the play of children with autism may be lacking in several ways. The young child may not be interested in objects at all, paying more attention to the movement of his hands, or a piece of string. If interested in toys, only certain ones may catch his interest, and these may be used in a repetitive way that is not consistent with how most children would play with the toy. They may be more interested in turning a toy car upside down and spinning the wheels than pushing the car back and forth. Overall, pretend qualities are nearly absent in the play of children with autism under 2 years of age.

It is important to note that in each of the 5 areas we have flagged, we are most concerned with behaviors that are absent or occur at very low rates. The absence of certain behaviors may be more difficult to pinpoint than the presence of atypical behaviors. But concerns in any of the above areas should prompt a parent to investigate screening their child for autism. Several screening measures are now available, and information from the screener will help to determine if the parent should pursue further evaluations. If the parent is convinced their child has autism, then they should seek an evaluation with an expert in autism. Most likely, this evaluation will involve an interview with the parents to obtain a complete developmental history of the child, and direct observations of the child in different situations.
Five Early Signs of Autism
from The Exceptional Parent - December 6, 2002
For more articles visit www.bridges4kids.org.

CARD Conference

CARD is holding their 15th annual conference in Lake Mary! Several excellent presenters will be there and we are really looking forward to it. We are lucky to have it in our own back yard this year. There is a free day for educators on January 25.


Read more about it here: https://secure.ucf-card.org/conference/conference.php

In My Mind

Prompts

The following infomation is about the use of prompts for students with ASD. Verbal prompts are the least intrusive of prompts. They can be ineffective for students with severe language delays. When using verbal prompts with students with ASD, less is more and the fewer words are used, the easier it often is for the child to process.


INDEPENDENT: The student knows how to do this task without any help from you.

INDIRECT VERBAL (IV): An indirect verbal prompt tells the student that something is expected but not exactly what. Example: "What next?" "Now what?" Start here when using the increasing hierarchy.

DIRECT VERBAL (DV): This is a direct statement of what we expect the student to do or say. Example: "Come here." "Put the glass on the counter." This level of prompt requires that the student be able to follow your direction. If the indirect verbal assist didn't work, move to this level.

GESTURE: Pointing, facial expression, mouthing words silently or otherwise indicating with a motion what you want the student to do.

MODELING: Modeling is simply showing the student what you want him or her to do. You do not physically touch the student. In order for modeling to work, the student must know how to imitate another person's actions.

PARTIAL PHYSICAL ASSIST (PPA): As the name suggests, a partial physical assist is less intense or intrusive than a full physical assist. If full physical assist is hand-over-hand, the partial physical assist can be visualized as providing minimal supportive guidance--touching the wrist to stabilize handwriting and encouraging the student to jump without actually lifting his or her body off the ground are two examples of providing PPA.

FULL PHYSICAL ASSIST (FPA): Hand-over-hand assistance to complete the targeted response. This is usually used when the target response is motor in nature. For example, a full physical assist might entail putting your hand on the student's hand and moving the student's hand through the action of writing his or her name. If the student is learning to jump up and down, providing a full physical assist would mean physically lifting the student up and down in a jumping motion. You will know before you start teaching if the student will need this type of assistance. If so, use the decreasing prompt hierarchy instead.

Information obtained from:
Homeschooling Kids With Disabilities. URL: http://www.members.tripod.com/~Maaja/
The Verbal Behavior Approach: How to Teach Children with Autism and Related ...
By Mary Barbera, Tracy