How Everyone on the Autism Spectrum, Young and Old, Can...:

This book is the result of a collaborative effort from three members of the staff at 'The Groden centre' an educational and treatment facility for people on the autistic spectrum and also by the founder of ‘Browns Child Centre'. All the authors are experienced in developmental disorders and in putting theory into practise.

The key objectives of the book are to help people on the spectrum and their carers/educators to develop character traits that will facilitate a happy outlook and the necessary resilience and skill base to cope with and reach their full potential.

Personality traits and skills such as kindness, courage, self-esteem, optimism, resilience, humour, and problem solving have been identified as the traits most likely to help someone on the spectrum to optimise their life chances and enjoyment.

The book is divided into two halves. The first discusses the key traits/skills such as Optimism and Reslience; the second half demonstrates how to foster the trait through a series of suggested exercises.

Overall I felt that the book was most suitable for teachers and professionals as it would take quite a lot of work for a parent to carry through with a child and may necessitate drawing on other resources to extend and reinforce the learning. I felt that it was most suited to the younger child or people who are intellectually/cognitively less able as many of the exercises were concerned with really basic skills or involved humour that would be too child-like for an older or more sophisticated person. The activities are clear and easy to follow and an experienced educator can easily expand and modify them to fit their students.

Much of the advice is simple and common sense and at times in such books I wonder if most parents are incompetent idiots or are just perceived to be. Surely most parents naturally do this with their children, firstly through their own actions and later by expecting kindness, explaining another person's viewpoint and needs and praising kindness. It is not usually necessary to schedule it into one's life, as it is as natural and automatic as breathing, and when one parents a child on the spectrum explaining the obvious also becomes a natural instinct. However, I appreciate that this criticism may be unjust as different parents come with different levels of awareness, experiences, understanding of their child's problems etc. The tasks are generally broken down into small, achievable units which I felt would help to ensure a child's success. At times I felt the scenarios which were designed to prepare a child for a particular event eg. making a phone call to order a pizza, failed to include the unforeseen. For instance, the child was urged to confirm that they had got through to the pizza restaurant but the scenario did not mention that this may not be necessary because many restaurants will answer their phone by stating the name of their establishment. so the child would then not need to ask - I appreciate that an experienced and skilled teacher would instinctively do this, but to reduce the chance of a child losing confidence, the child needs to understand that a scripted exercise may go off script. They should be prepared by having at least some ideas of how else the conversation might go.

The book draws heavily on positive psychology and CBT which help a child develop resilience . It does recognise that we are all born with different strengths and weaknesses and that those on the spectrum may for example have an exaggerated physiological response to stress. I felt not enough was said about the biological factors which influence our personality and that some people are born with a naturally more sunny disposition and are therefore more likely to have parents who are also genetically more positive. Learning self-awareness about this genetic package then gives all concerned a greater chance of identifying strengths and weaknesses and the persistence to improve on the weak areas to help make life more enjoyable. There is a tendency for such books to act as if everything to do with one's personality and mood is learnt, which gives a very skewed view and, in my opinion, it is only by taking a balanced view of both nature and nurture can we hope to maximise each person's potential.

In Chapter 5 I was pleased to see a paragraph acknowledging how difficult it can be to raise a child on the spectrum and appreciating that parents do not always have the time, finances or energy to cope. However I feel that this point needs to be accentuated and made at the beginning of the book and will not only demonstrate to parents that the stress they might be under is understood, but will also serve to remind the professionals.

I have some cognitive difficulties with the tendency of positive thinking books to demonise being negative when in reality it is often just realism and to put being positive on a pedestal when in reality it is often unrealistic. Both states of optimism and pessimism can be equally unrealistic and if we are to really help a child they need to learn to see the range of possible outcomes and then structure it into the most realistic and probable. To do this one needs to see the positive and the negative and then take a moderate perspective. I have concerns about the current tendency to tell a child to think positive and then can do anything . For instance a physically plain child no matter how positive is not likely to win a beauty pageant. I believe we should teach out children n realism,

I have two key criticisms, both of which are common to most work-books so I am not singling this one out. I am so often left wondering when some of these kids have time to just be children, their lives seem to be so mapped out and constrained by a series of planned tasks, hobbies, and agendas all aimed at helping them to cope or normalising them. I feel that many of the skills which everyone is taking such pains to teach tham are likely to be developmentally acquired when the child is ready, just as with neuro-typical children they suddenly mature and may for example stop teasing a sibling ,not because they have been repeatedly chastised but just through a natural process of maturation. Likewise people on the spectrum seem to suddenly mature and become able to acquire hitherto unreachable skills, albeit at a different pace. My second concern is that there is something sad about timetabling in humour, for surely it should be a natural part of everyday - will parents be asked to time table a cuddle or telling a child ‘I love You'. We seem to be, as a society and in our institutions ,getting so far away from natural, healthy small community that we have to add back in what should already be present. Much as in junk food one has to add the vitamins, minerals and roughage back in - why remove it to begin with?

In the end I have to conclude that the right supportive, warm, kind, loving, sensitive and intelligent environment will naturally foster traits that help children on the spectrum navigate through life and if this is not happening naturally then I suppose it is better that we self-consciously direct some positive and supportive changes. I can recommend this book for professionals but feel that it would take a determined parent to find the energy and time to work through the book.