I cannot take credit for these extremely wise words. They come from the mouth of a 14 year old ASD boy; Jacob Barnett. But I tell you what, these words changed my life, because they changed my understanding of how my son learns, and what he needs in order to learn.
How did I find out about this amazing child? Well, a couple of years ago I became slightly obsessed with TED talks (a nonprofit devoted to spreading ideas, usually in the form of short, powerful talks) using many of them as a teaching tool, mainly for my older classes (I am a Secondary school teacher). Well, Jacob Barnett was in the news because he was doing a Masters in the field of condensed matter (at aged 14!). His work was so original that he set a record, becoming the world's youngest astrophysics researcher. Anyway, when I typed his name in Google, I found he had done a TEDxTeen talk called "Forget what you know" (I highly recommend watching it).
So, what did I learn from this unique young man? How did I find out about this amazing child? Well, a couple of years ago I became slightly obsessed with TED talks (a nonprofit devoted to spreading ideas, usually in the form of short, powerful talks) using many of them as a teaching tool, mainly for my older classes (I am a Secondary school teacher). Well, Jacob Barnett was in the news because he was doing a Masters in the field of condensed matter (at aged 14!). His work was so original that he set a record, becoming the world's youngest astrophysics researcher. Anyway, when I typed his name in Google, I found he had done a TEDxTeen talk called "Forget what you know" (I highly recommend watching it).
Firstly that I had to allow my son to look at things in his own unique perspective. To do this he had to "stop learning and start thinking". At the time, the summer holidays were approaching and even though the therapists gave me a lot of material to practice, I decided to not really do too much. The odd lesson here and there and one or two worksheets at the beginning of the holidays. I decided to take a risk (as I was constantly being told that he had to be worked continuously) and let him think through all the material that he had learnt that year. And guess what...it worked!
Observing him, i could see that he was working things out, that the wheels in his head were turning. Words, verbs, nouns - they suddenly became clear to him. For the first time he could show me exactly which noun / verb I was saying without repetition and hesitation. He did so well that most of the therapists thought I had worked him all summer long. I would just smile and keep my little secret, whispering it to myself, (thank you Jacob Barnett).
From that day on, we made sure we gave our son some thinking time. Even now we organise his lessons into blocks of time, (September to Christmas, January to Easter, after Easter to summer) and give him a whole week off afternoon therapies halfway through each block, so he can think about the material he has covered.
The second thing that clicked for me, was the notion - why does an ASD child need to do all the things another child does. Barnett was working on disproving one of Einstein's theories and he is a child prodigy, but he can't draw a cat or tie up his shoelaces - so how important are these little skills in the grand scheme of things? My son struggled with his colours and learning songs. How important are these things in his life? Not very, so I told his therapists to lay off them for a while. I would like to say that he knows them now, but that would be lying. Some days he knows his colours, some days he doesn't. When he is happy he sings song he knows, but we don't push him to pronounce each word clearly. We just enjoy his happiness.
So there it is, true inspiration from a truly remarkable source.
