The Autism Society Event and Education Recordings Archive

The Network, a special interest group with worldwide family and professional membership provides information across autism spectrum lifespan and sensory disabilities with opportunities for interaction with a professional panel. Special report: Teaching language and literacy to hearing and visually impaired students with autism using Structured Methods in Language Education: SMILE. Implemented in several Florida schools, preschool to high school, methods and changes are reported. The panel will address acceptance and adaptations of communication systems by family and community. The Network Meeting will begin with a review of the new association with the Autism Reseach Institute and website, www.autism.com.  A special link to the Network's free membership form as well as special interest presentation links including previous meetings will be described.  Updates on current issues specific to our members concerns in visual and hearing impairments as well as living with autism will include testing across sensory modalities, medications with secondary effects on different senses, education and employment opportunities.  A followup on personal safety and access to a new website for professionals, police and community responders and educators will be discussed.  Training on using this site's specific resource information is being extended from New York to three states, Illinois, Nevada and Florida. The Network maintains its formost concern that members do not feel isolated even among other families with individuals having autism.

A formal presentation on a structured approach to teaching language and literacy to hearing and visually impaired students with autism: SMILE will be featured.  This will include infomation from the developer of the program as well as individuals training others to implment the program in Flordia schools.  It was originally designed to teach beginning speech and language to deaf children and was then adapted to meet the needs of individuals with autism and also visual impairments.  SMILE focuses on individuals from preschool to high school who have the most severe disorders of language and literacy.  Many students had no intelligble speech at program start.  The presenters will demonstrate adaptations and present the scope and sequence of the program.  Documentation will be provided demonstrating incremental changes and  successes of the program across students as well as individual anecdotes. The presenters will also discuss issues in training and gaining cooperation with the program among teaching staff and families.

The professional  panel will continue ongoing concerns in helping families and community members recognize the need for specific communication alternatives as well as ways to augment communication.  The issues of having language systems for learning as well as interacting are more complex when the community at large as well as extended family members may not have skills in sharing a specfic or idiosnycratic  system.  Emotional issues about differences in how both the student and the family member are seen sometimes impact  the range and mobility an individual can have.  The audience will be invited to add their comments and concerns. This is a difficult issue for professionals as well as parents/family members themselves with or without a visual or hearing impairment.

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