United States of Autism official trailer:
Tag Archives: watch
Stephen Conti: ADHD as a Difference in Cognition
Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder has been known to be characterised by an ‘inability to focus or concerntrate’, ‘restlessness’, ‘constant fidgeting’, and short attention span’. It has been found that between 2-5% of the population have ADHD, and to date, there is no known cure for it (although medications such as Ritalin are prescribed to suppress sympotms).
In the video below, Stephen Conti argues that people should change how they view ADHD. Instead of seeing it as a deficit in attention and activity, Conti proposes that ADHD is a difference in cognition. For instance, people with ADHD can hyper-focus on things that excite them. Stephen alludes to the fact that kids and adults with ADHD should be allowed to flourish, instead of giving them drugs just to keep them quiet.
Young Blind boy with Autism sings “Open the eyes of my heart”
22 Things a Woman Must Know If She Loves a Man with Asperger’s Syndrome
The Autistic Me: A BBC Documentary
Below are Youtube links to a fascinating documentary which featured the daily lives of three men who have Autism. I am sharing this because it highlights how different individuals with Autism are to one another. It also shows how challenging life can be if you or one of your family members have Autism.
What is it like to grow up with Autism? How hard could the transition to adulthood be? Is it easy to find a job? What about finding a girlfriend? If you want to find out, watch the clips below:
REMEMBER: It is important to know what it is like to live with Autism in order for us to understand them better. Knowing more about this condition will help us build better relationships, and communicate and work with them effectively.
PART 1:
PART 2:
PART 3:
PART 4:
PART 5:
PART 6:
More on Autism:
He flaps his hands and screams a lot but he doesn’t mean to annoy you
Optimum Outcomes for people with Autism
DSM 5 and its implications to ASD diagnosis
Diagnosing Autism: What you need to know
Vote for Miss Montana 2012, Alexis Wineman
Communication difficulties in Autism
Big Bang Theory’s Sheldon Cooper: Asperger’s Syndrome’s Poster Boy?
Still unsure if Sheldon has Asperger’s?
The Autistic Me: BBC Documentary
Temple Grandin: The world needs all kinds of minds
Autism in the classroom:
Guide to parents of students with ASD on coping with the first day back to school
Common signs of Autism in the classroom
First day back to school: Top tips for parents of children with Autism
Practical tips to make your classroom Autism-Friendly
Inspiring People with Autism:
Jessica-Jane Applegate (British Paralympian)
Satoshi Tajiri (Pokemon creator)
More on Savants:
The Psychology of Savants: Memory Masters
The Einstein Effect: Is there a link between having Autism and being a genius?
Still unsure if Big Bang Theory’s Sheldon Cooper has Asperger’s Syndrome or not? Check out these clips
I’ve previously covered why I think Sheldon Cooper has Asperger’s Syndrome (click here). Despite a multitude of support to my claim in the show, I’ve been told that the producers refuse to comment on this issue. Below are some more clips which I think further shows why Sheldon has Asperger’s:
Sheldon’s hair:
In the clip below, Sheldon is a couple of dates late for his haircut because his barber is ill. The clip below shows how Sheldon prefers routines and predictability- a characteristic common with people with Autism and Asperger’s Syndrome. He gets his haircut from Mr. Denafrio, and Mr. Denafrio alone.
Sheldon gets a date:
Sheldon struggles to understand the unwritten rules of communication- another characteristic exhibited by people with Autism and Asperger’s Syndrome. In this scene, he was trying to get a date for Penny, but ends up getting a date for himself because of his lack of grasp of social conventions:
Amy is angry at Sheldon:
Sheldon here was faced with a dilemma: shall he choose his girlfriend, Amy or his new found friend, Will Wheaton? Amy became angry at Sheldon because he did not defend her. This shows how difficult it could be for people with Asperger’s to maintain social relationships. This further highlights how important a role Sheldon’s friends and mother plays on his life.
Sheldon and Amy on a date:
Another scene which shows his lack of social understanding:
Number 43:
In this episode, Howard and Raj stalked Sheldon due to their curiousity about what he does at 2.45pm. What was missing in the clip below is Sheldon’s explanation of why he escapes to that old storage room. He told Raj and Howard:
“…you may not realise it but I have difficulties navigating certain aspects of real life. Not understading sarcasm, feigning interest in others, not talking about trains as much as I want to. It’s exhausting! Which is why for twenty minutes a day, I had to go down to that room, turn my mind off and do what I need to do to recharge… You don’t need to know; you don’t deserve to know and you will never know (what 43 is and what I do)!”
To me, this room is very similar to a quiet room or a sensory room, which some people- especially young ones, use to calm down.
Sheldon asks Penny not to break up with Leonard:
In this last clip, Sheldon shows his good side, asking Penny not to break up with his best friend, Leonard. This shows that despite his struggles with social rules and conventions (he went into Penny’s apartment in the middle of the night), he can still show compassion in his own unusual ways. People with Asperger’s Syndrome may have find a lot of social situations challenging, but that does not mean that they are incapable of feeling emotions that neurotypicals do. They may not express these emotions in the ways that we are accustomed to, but they sure have their ways.
More on Autism:
He flaps his hands and screams a lot but he doesn’t mean to annoy you
Optimum Outcomes for people with Autism
DSM 5 and its implications to ASD diagnosis
Diagnosing Autism: What you need to know
Vote for Miss Montana 2012, Alexis Wineman
Communication difficulties in Autism
Big Bang Theory’s Sheldon Cooper: Asperger’s Syndrome’s Poster Boy?
The Autistic Me: BBC Documentary
Temple Grandin: The world needs all kinds of minds
Autism in the classroom:
Guide to parents of students with ASD on coping with the first day back to school
Common signs of Autism in the classroom
First day back to school: Top tips for parents of children with Autism
Practical tips to make your classroom Autism-Friendly
Inspiring People with Autism:
Jessica-Jane Applegate (British Paralympian)
Satoshi Tajiri (Pokemon creator)
More on Savants:
The Psychology of Savants: Memory Masters
The Einstein Effect: Is there a link between having Autism and being a genius?
The Einstein Effect: Is there a relationship between having Autism and being a genius?
This documentary features one of science’s enigmas, the Savants, a.k.a. ‘The Knowing Ones’. There are less than 100 known Savants in the world today and half of them have Autism. These people have extraordinary talents in areas such as Mathematics and Art. A lot of them have brilliant memories, too (check out my post on The Psychology of Savants: Memory Masters). Scientists in the documentary below conducted experiements that looked at the workings of the brain to answer questions about how the brains of the Savants work. They also wondered whether geniuses such as Albert Einstein and Mozart had Autism. Watch and enjoy:
Part 1:
Part 2:
Part 3:
Part 4:
Part 5:
More on Savants:
Vote for Miss Montana, Alexis Wineman
The Psychology of Savants: Memory Masters
More on Autism:
Communication difficulties in Autism
Big Bang Theory’s Sheldon Cooper: Asperger’s Syndrome’s Poster Boy?
Guide to parents of students with ASD on coping with the first day back to school
Inspiring People with Autism:
Jessica-Jane Applegate (British Paralympian)
The Secret Life of the Manic Depressive (BBC Documentary)
Below is an old-ish BBC documentary about Manic Depression, also known as Bipolar Disorder, presented by Stephen Fry. There are two subtypes of bipolar disorder: Bipolar I and Bipolar II. According to the Diagnostic Statistical Manual of Psychiatric Disorders (DSM-VI), a person has to have an episode of mania for at least a week in his/her lifetime in order to be diagnosed with Bipolar I. A diagnosis of Bipolar II on the other hand, requires an episode of hypomania and an episode of depression.
Enjoy the documentary:
Part 1:
Part 2:
Jane Elliot’s A Classroom Divided: A classic lesson in prejudice
This is an old documentary about Jane Elliot’s thought-provoking exercise. In 1968, she divided a class of third-graders into two groups- blue-eyed and brown-eyed and told the children that blue-eyed people are better than brown-eyed ones. Watch what happened:
What do you think about this? What can we learn from this?
Please drop me some lines on the comment box below.
PEOPLE WITH DISABILITIES, NOT DISABILITIES WITH PEOPLE
Over the past three weeks, the BBC has shown a documentary (WATCH BELOW) which featured musically talented individuals with Tourette’s syndrome (TS). Tourette’s syndrome is a neurological condition characterised by uncontrollable motor and/ or verbal tics. At the time of writing, there is no known cause of the condition and hence, treatments are still being developed.
In the programme, DJ/ TV presenter Reggie Yates interviewed each of the individuals to find out the severity of their TS and the extent to which their condition has affected their lives. Reggie also found that their tics however severe disappeared whenever they sing or play a musical instrument. Doing so gave them a sense of calm. These individuals were then brought together in a studio and over a period of eight weeks, they rehearsed for a concert which they performed in front of a lot of people.
I felt that the series showed how their diagnoses are only a part of their personalities. Each of them has an incredible talent which, sadly has been over-shadowed by their Tourette’s. More often than not, people tend only to focus on what people cannot do rather than what they can do. The reason why I wrote the last sentence is due to the comments made in Twitter. Almost every tweet mentioned how great, wonderful and gifted this group of people are and that their ability to stand up and sing on the concert was a massive achievement- almost a miracle. While I agree to all of those statements, I was amazed how surprised these people are with what they saw. To me, this highlights the need for us to get to know each individual that we meet, regardless of whether they have a physical and/ or psychological condition or not, as a whole person. We should not let others’ disabilities mask who they truly are. Yes, their conditions are a part of themselves and that we need to tailor our behaviours and language to their needs. But their conditions are a fraction of a whole person. Focus on what they CAN, not on what they CAN’T do.
Working with students with Special Educational Needs gave me the opportunity to see how each individual, regardless of their condition, have a unique set of strengths, limitations and extraordinary talent. Majority of students who were surrounded with people who have a clear understanding of their diagnoses and the willingness to get to know them have flourished beyond what most professionals expected. So please, open your mind, throw stereotypes out of the window and get to know each person as a whole.
Here’s the whole series:
Part 1:
Part 2:
Part 3
People in th UK can also watch Part 3 on BBC iplayer: CLICK HERE
For more information on Tourette’s Syndrome, click on the links below:
Understanding and Embracing Diversity 