An interesting visit
Boy X came to visit our class today and I was thoroughly excited and engaged. He is in sixth grade and he is 12 years old. He came to our class to discuss not only his life but how he deals with having Asperger’s Syndrome. He began by discussing being home schooled. The pros for him are the abilities to learn a lot and at his own pace, to research what he likes and use various media such as computers, as well as if he cannot do something there is always a substitution. The cons for X are that he has his life controlled, there are no snow days, in addition he misses school and a lot of things but not so much the people. He views his AS as a neurological difference that people should celebrate it is not a handicap. He has had positive experiences and has great friends, because he has the ability to be many different type of people. He has many sides or personalities to him such as his musical or yugeo, some are mature, some immature, and some are just right. He likes to act a lot, pretending is fun.
He drew a circle on the board explaining and describing his “wheel of obsession”. In a circle, clockwise, he writes: like it-develop interest- draw it-do it a lot- talk about it- loose interest- find something else and then we return back to like it. This wheel describes what happens in X’s head with things in his life. He is very twitchy and shaky as well as very good at changing subjects. He discussed that when he doesn’t like something he can sometimes scream, cry, even dramatize and manipulate things. He has a hard time with social relationships, knowing that is ok or acceptable to do and say. He learns lessons with every choice that he makes, like how he feels with things and situations.
There was a serious situation with X at his school and he was removed thereafter. This, although needed to be done, he still misses certain people. He is less stressed now being home schooled. His favorite subject is Science and Math, logical subjects but dislikes Language Arts even though he is good at it because of the spelling. He does not like to do worksheets and loves to learn and experiment. Does not like gym because he not only thinks he is bad at it but hates the competitiveness of other students. When he loses at something, like a game in gym, he feels bad and others often blame him, making X feel worse. His brain works in various was, sometimes it is very fast, and sometimes it is very slow. When he is doing harder things like math it works fast at first then slows down. He related this to running through mud. He said that you run really fast at first and then slow down when you get caught. He is good with similes and metaphors but not understanding them or jokes from other people.
When asked to describe Asperger’s he said that there are many pros and cons. There are many famous people who have AS and one in 150 people have it. His brain works a little slower for things that require a lot of thinking but are simple things that everyone thinks are easy. His brain works faster than anyone else. He finds it hard to relate to others and feels and is often targeted by other kids. He was tricked to do inappropriate things. His advice for educators was to give kids with AS extra help, to put all your strength into it, until the thing you’re working on is done. He did not want other kids to know he has AS because they might treat him different and he could become a target. He says he is already a nerd and it would only make it worse. He can become very argumentative and describes his head like a bomb, it is very explosive. The last thing that was discussed what X would change, he would make it so that he did not have AS. But he rethinks this because of other famous people with AS, he would change how he is with others, being more “socially perfect”. These insights are what educators, students, and human beings need to see in order to better understand all who may have AS.
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