Some teachers just have a knack for working with autistic children. Other teachers do not have it.
Temple GrandinRead
I've always thought of myself as a cattle-handling specialist, a college professor first; autism is secondary.
Interpretation
Temple Grandin highlights her professional identity as an educator and cattle-handling expert, suggesting that her autism is just one aspect of her identity.
In this quote, Temple Grandin emphasizes the importance of viewing oneself through the lens of one's skills and contributions rather than solely through a diagnosis. By identifying herself first as a cattle-handling specialist and a college professor, she reveals her belief that one's identity should not be limited by societal labels, and that achievements and expertise take precedence over challenges posed by autism.
In practice
In a keynote speech about overcoming challenges.
Some teachers just have a knack for working with autistic children. Other teachers do not have it.
Language just gradually came in, one or two stressed words a time. Before then, I would just scream. I couldn't talk. I couldn't get my words out. So the only way I could tell someone what I wanted was to scream. If I didn't want to wear a hat, the only way I knew to communicate was screaming and throwing it on the floor.
If you have a 2 or 3 year old who is not talking, you must start an early intervention program. The worst thing you can do with an autistic 3 year old is to do nothing.
I strongly recommend that students with autism get involved in special interest clubs in some of the areas they naturally excel at. Being with people who share your interests makes socializing easier.
What would happen if the autism gene was eliminated from the gene pool? You would have a bunch of people standing around in a cave, chatting and socializing and not getting anything done.
I donβt want my thoughts to die with me, I want to have done something. Iβm not interested in power, or piles of money. I want to leave something behind. I want to make a positive contribution - know that my life has meaning.
Schools are not intended to moralize a wicked world, but to impart knowledge and develop intelligence, with only two social aims in mind: prepare to take on one's share in the world's work, and perhaps in addition, lend a hand in improving society, after schooling is done.
I view it as one of the greatest crimes to shadow the minds of the young with these gloomy superstitions, and with fears of the unknown and the unknowable to poison all their joy in life.
Likewise, there is no evidence that texting teaches people to spell badly: rather, research shows that those kids who text frequently are more likely to be the most literate and the best spellers, because you have to know how to manipulate language.
Humans are not ideally set up to understand logic; they are ideally set up to understand stories.
Reading things that are relevant to the facts of your life is of limited value. The facts are, after all, only the facts, and the yearning passionate part of you will not be met there. That is why reading ourselves as a fiction as well as fact is so liberating. The wider we read the freer we become.
When I open them, most of the books have the smell of an earlier time leaking out between the pages - a special odor of the knowledge and emotions that for ages have been calmly resting between the covers. Breathing it in, I glance through a few pages before returning each book to its shelf.
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