The other day at work my co-worker told me something that really upset me. I was talking to my student with autism who asked me to come talk to him and I told him "I can't. I don't have any space." My co-worker overheard me and told me "they don't understand that." I ignored him because I found it extremely rude. The student responded "oh, right." The way he responded, it was clear he knew what I meant. My co-worker upset me because first of all it was not his conversation, but mostly he's completely wrong. If someone does not communicate the same way you do, it does not mean they don't understand. This is something a lot of people seem to not understand. I talk to that student all the time, whereas my co-worker has admitted that he does not care about his job and ignores them. It was not right for him to correct me when I know this child better than him and actually understand what it is like to be autistic.
Everyone should understand that students with disabilities struggle with communication. My student probably could not have said all the words I said, but he understood the concept. There is a difference in understanding words and being able to verbalize them. If a student is minimally verbal they still understand words, they just may not know how to form those words. I have met a few ignorant people ever since I got diagnosed and I want to stress how important it is to not treat these kids like they are babies. For some reason, people think that if a student can only speak so much, then they only understand that much. This is false. Even I struggle to form words sometimes, but I can understand what people want out of me most of the time. There will be times that these kids don't understand, but they usually get the gist. It will also not always be obvious that they got it. You really have to listen to students with disabilities. If you ignore them all the time, you will never learn how to communicate with them.
I have a student with selective mutism and even she communicates with me. She does not speak, but we use gestures, write things down, and even sometimes can simply use our body language to communicate. The fact that she does not speak has nothing to do with the ability to understand me. She does speak to me if we are one-on-one, but even then, it is very quiet and she just started speaking to me after knowing me for 7 months. It is difficult for these students to communicate, but being completely ignorant to the fact that they can will make them less motivated to in the first place.
Another issue I have been made aware of is the "inability" to joke. This is also false knowledge. Children with autism and other disabilities know what a joke is and how to joke. A lot of the time they find different things funny than the average person or may joke differently, but they are capable of doing it. In my case, I have an idea of when someone is joking, but sometimes miss what the actual joke was or may not laugh. I watch a lot of sitcoms that are really funny, but you will rarely see me laugh at the TV. My facial expressions just don't always match how I am feeling. This may be why people think we don't understand. I usually understand the jokes and think the show is funny, but I don't know to laugh. It's like an internalized feeling. Then, there is the opposite where something really sad may happen and I start laughing. Internally, I am probably sad or uncomfortable, but all I can think to do is laugh, so it doesn't match my feelings. This also goes hand in hand with communication. Since those of us with disabilities don't always express things how "society" thinks is correct, it just is wrong to a lot of people. In reality, it is just a different form of communication.
The thought that these students don't know how to joke came from me telling someone a story about my student. Let's call him David. David has a big crush on me and saw a picture of my boyfriend on my phone. He is a very dramatic child. He said "oh, it's okay. David love someone else." I spoke to him to make him feel better and eventually when he wasn't so sad, he said "David love Ms. S again." The person I told this to thought that it sounded like in his mind we were in a relationship. In the classroom is was obvious that David was just messing around and being dramatic, but on the outside it may seem like he did think we were dating. I was told that this person didn't know these types of students could make jokes. This is an example of how they may joke differently. I know people with disabilities who love to photobomb each other and that in itself shows that they like to mess around as much as the average person. It may take longer for students to understand jokes or you may have to explain the joke to them, but once they get it, they will try to use it in their own way. It is so important to remember that just because someone with a disability communicates different from you, it does not mean they don't know how to communicate.
The last important piece of information I have is that these students may communicate differently, but it isn't a foreign language. A few people at work have said "it is so interesting how they have their own language that we don't understand, but they understand each other." This is not completely true. I told her that I understand them fine. They do communicate different, so I understand where she is coming from, but it is not so different that you can't understand. They often simplify ideas and talk like that. For example, I remember one time I asked a student to give another student his milk he was not going to drink. He looked at me confused, so I had to reword it. Before I could, his brother said "milk" and pointed to the other student. His brother understood what I wanted and told him the same thing. All he did was simplify the wording. The reason a person may not understand them is because they are not paying attention. They shorten sentences a lot and if you are not keeping up, it is easy to get lost. It may be difficult to understand them at times, but it is not a completely different form of speaking. I realize it is a different way of communication, but it is not a foreign way of communicating. There is a difference in not getting it at all and just needing more time to understand them. Try to listen to what those with disabilities are in need of. It will require a lot of patience, but it is possible.
FYI all names are fake for privacy reasons.
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