Autism Night

This evening my group took a trip over to the children's museum and spent a few hours there for autism night. It was a great learning experience, even though only two autistic children came in. The first boy's name was Austen and he was four years old. He was diagnosed with autism when he was two years old. He was very hyper, and very rarely stayed in one place for more than 15-20 seconds. He is always on the move, and he loves to dance around and climb on anything possible. While we were watching him play, his mother was anxious to talk about him and his condition and she was willing to answer any questions we had. She mentioned that Austen has a very high pain tolerance and never cries. When he hits his head hard she said that he just lets out a death scream. A little later Logan came in with his parents and little brother. Logan was also four years old and knows Austen from school. Logan was different than Austen in that he was much more calm and was not running around and climbing on things all the time. He could speak much better than Austen and had a much longer attention span. Logan's mother and father were also very much willing to talk about his condition and were happy to answer the questions we had. Neither of these two boys were completely potty trained, which makes it very hard for their teachers when they go to school. Later we went and painted and drew on the chalkboard with the children. I know it has got to be hard for their parents and could not imagine what a handful it must be. I really enjoyed playing with these boys even though they were a handful. It was great talking to the boys' parents and I could tell they enjoyed telling us anything we wanted to know.