Order from a Major Online Bookstore
Ultimate Book Price Comparison Engine
Save Your Time And Money
| AnyBook4Less.com | Order from a Major Online Bookstore |
|
| Home | Store List | FAQ | Contact Us | | ||
| Ultimate Book Price Comparison Engine Save Your Time And Money |
||
 |
Title: Helping Children With Autism Learn: A Guide to Treatment Approaches for Parents and Professionals by Bryna Siegel ISBN: 0-19-513811-2 Publisher: Oxford University Press Pub. Date: 01 May, 2003 Format: Hardcover Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $30.00 |
Average Customer Rating: 3.33 (3 reviews)
Rating: 3
Summary: Often misses the real point, simplifies
Comment: As an educator of children, adolescents and adults with autism for over 20 years, I read with dismay Dr. Siegel's simplification of many behaviors exhibited by people with autism. She often makes statements as though they are fact, such as the "why" of many behaviors. At first, it seemed to be an occasional error, but after reading and reading, the book clearly makes arrogant statements about children, parents and education of those with autism which are just plain wrong or strongly misleads with assumptions, rather than factual knowledge.
It dismays me to think that a parent, particularly a parent of a young child with autism, would take these statements as absolute fact, simply because they are written by a Dr. Too often, these highly vulnerable parents come away either with false hope, or with utter dispair about what they have just read in her book.
Rating: 2
Summary: Hinders learning -- detailed data, skewed interpretations
Comment: Having been told that this was an improvement over the author's previous book, I had high hopes for it. Sometimes it was: It focuses less on the differences between different autistic diagnoses, and views autism as a collection of learning disabilities, each of which can happen different amounts in different people. Siegel acknowledges that autistic people can learn and grow, which is an improvement over the pessimism of her previous book.
The author has done direct and indirect research on autistic people. As in the previous book, detail is a strong point, the language advanced and technical. It attempts to consolidate a large amount of data into a form that parents and professionals can learn from, both in understanding the way autistic people work and in how to teach us.
The catch: While she describes our behavior in exquisite detail, the author frequently misses the mark on the internal. Often terribly. It is not because she is not autistic -- many neurotypical people can form accurate models of autistic people, if they look at all the data available. The problem is that she does not look at all the data. The biggest gap in the research for this book, as shown in the references, is in finding the reasons autistic people say we do certain things. Most of the reasons she gives for autistic people's actions look like guesswork. These may be true for some people, but looking at what autistics write would have shown her there were more. Given the amount of literature by autistic people these days, there is no excuse for ignoring it.
Throughout the book, behavior that may have purpose is described as unnecessary. The author writes about echolalia, rigid routines, mental downtime, and stereotypic behavior (like rocking or flapping) as if they are purposeless, unnecessary, and harmless to eliminate. Repeating the same words can aid auditory processing -- I used to do it as a child until I either understood words or memorized them to understand later. Stereotypies often have sensory benefits, and can help autistic people to learn and attend to other stimuli. When it is extinguished, many parents and autistics alike have described overload, pain, aggression, and self-injury. Routines, within reason, can provide order to the environment and reduce the amount of stimuli that must be attended to, allowing an autistic person to function better. Mental downtime gives us time to process information. When professionals prevented me from getting it I could not function. This is all written about by both autistic people and parents. Yet the author often states the exact opposite, and expresses confusion about why parents worry that quelling these things could harm a child. Given how many of us have said precisely why these things are useful to many of us, and precisely why indiscriminately removing them can harm us, I have to wonder how much she is paying attention and how much is guessing.
The author seems, in all of these examples, to be coming at autism as if these things are more compulsive in nature than useful. While some autistic people have obsessions and compulsions that control us, many have reasons for doing these things. A good deal of this book makes us sound as if we are strange moving objects that do things for no reason and need to be shaped into moving objects that do less unusual things for reasons that non-autistic people can understand. This is not who or what we are.
Another disturbing idea here is that a fairly large number of autistic people can grow up to be 'normalized', and that diagnosing these people with autism would be inaccurate. This is based on the ability to pass for non-autistic and function, and has little to do with the inside of the person. I have known autistic people who fit into this category -- until they had a breakdown, attempted suicide, or quit trying to function, all from the strain and overload of maintaining unnatural behavior. That is what the future holds for many of the autistic people that Siegel is claiming only have 'minor' problems and are not autistic. She is, in doing this and in classifying autistic people according to linear spectra like functioning level, IQ, and developmental age (I don't seem to fit -- I have an average-to-high IQ and poor everyday functioning), looking at the surface. Autism is not a surface condition. The author seems unable to get much below our surface behavior without misinterpreting what lies beneath. Perhaps if she read things by more than just one or two autistic people, and truly paid attention, she would understand more.
Similar errors occur throughout the book, beyond the above examples, indistinguishable on the surface from the accurate parts. While it claims to offer ways to individualize things for each person, it mainly uses a lot of detailed descriptions without detailed explanations. Descriptions fit my and others' behavior well while misinterpreting or oversimplifying the purpose. Blanket assumptions about behavior are made when there could be dozens of reasons and responses (which would be a better use for the author's talent for detail).
It scares me that a parent could pick this book up, see the wealth of detail and study that has gone into it, and figure that the conclusions of the author must be sound for their own child. I would not want to have been taught based on the principles in this book. When many of these ideas were applied to me, they hindered my learning rather than helping it. This book looks a whole lot more impressive and substantial than it really is. While it is sometimes accurate, I would not expect parents of newly-diagnosed children to be able to sift the accurate and useful from the inaccurate and harmful. If the author had been scientific enough to say "We don't know why they do this" instead of guessing, this book could have been much better.
Rating: 5
Summary: A Gem!
Comment: I become so overwhelmed with joy when I come across a book that is practical, informative and inspiring! Ms. Siegel's years of experience working with individuals with autistic spectrum disorders is so wonderfully conveyed in this book. Ms. Siegel very thoroughly and intelligently discusses (without using unnecessary psychological jargon) the varying degrees of abilities characteristic of ASDs & recommends appropriate treatment plans.
As the mother of a two-year-old son recently diagnosed with autism, I urge all professionals and families who have personal contact with individuls with ASDs to read this book; it is truly insightful.
 |
Title: The World of the Autistic Child: Understanding and Treating Autistic Spectrum Disorders by Bryna Siegel ISBN: 0195119177 Publisher: Oxford University Press Pub. Date: 01 January, 1998 List Price(USD): $16.95 |
 |
Title: Playing, Laughing and Learning with Children on the Autism Spectrum: A Practical Resource of Play Ideas for Parents and Carers by Julia Moor ISBN: 1843100606 Publisher: Taylor & Francis Group Pub. Date: 01 November, 2002 List Price(USD): $18.95 |
 |
Title: Educating Children With Autism ISBN: 0309072697 Publisher: National Academy Press Pub. Date: October, 2001 List Price(USD): $39.95 |
 |
Title: Toilet Training for Individuals with Autism and Related Disorders by Maria Wheeler ISBN: 1885477457 Publisher: Future Horizons Pub. Date: 01 April, 1998 List Price(USD): $19.95 |
 |
Title: Relationship Development Intervention with Young Children: Social and Emotional Development Activities for Asperger Syndrome, Autism, PDD and NLD by Steven E. Gutstein, Rachelle K. Sheely ISBN: 1843107147 Publisher: Jessica Kingsley Publishers Pub. Date: 30 April, 2002 List Price(USD): $22.95 |
Thank you for visiting www.AnyBook4Less.com and enjoy your savings!
Copyright� 2001-2021 Send your comments
