Two Autistics on Autism

Two articles on recent public speaking appearances by autistic speakers, both of which coincidentally mention fear in their headlines, but aren't (happily) actually about fear.

The first article ESU conference says that fear, ignorance make autism 'too complicated' is on Will Stillman who was the keynote speaker at a local autism conference in Pennsylvania. Almost the entire article is Stillman's own words, which are fabulous and quite worth reading. There's really no comment I can make that is any better than just reading for yourself. This quote was my favorite. It's one I'll be remembering, definitely.

"My interest isn't what causes autism, but rather what autism causes," Stillman said. "While advances have been made to the awareness of autism, advances haven't been made in how we handle it."

The second article Autism view: Fear is the enemy is on Temple Grandin who spoke at a conference for educators in North Dakota. There's less direct quoting by Grandin (and I strongly disagree with the assertion that the "primary emotion" for autistic people is fear), but there's some really good stuff in the article too. I'm particularly fond of Grandin's urging to allow autistic students to take math classes "out of order,"

"I absolutely cannot do algebra, was never allowed to try geometry and trigonometry. For certain kinds of minds, algebra is not the prerequisite," she said. The autistic, she said, can be "advanced in one subject, special education in another subject."

(For me though it's "I absolutely cannot do arithmetic, was almost not allowed to try algebra. For my kind of mind arithmetic is not the prerequisite!" I always urge teachers to allow students who struggle with a "more basic" math to try a "more advanced" math because this story is so common.)