A Gift of Sight: Visual Perception Treatment for Autistic Children
Every child with autism is affected in a different way, which makes it hard to find the exact treatments your child needs to deal with his or her symptoms. Some autistic children, but not all of them, have trouble understanding what they see. By using some standard ways to help improve visual awareness, you can help your child see the world more clearly. This will make it easier for your child to learn and understand, and it may also help with behaviour problems.
Most of the time, autistic children have problems with too much or too little physical input. Many people who don’t have the disorder also have some of these problems, which is why there are many ways to treat them. But people with autism often find that the world is too much for them to handle because of the light, colours, contrast, forms, and patterns. This makes them act out or shut down in general. This is sometimes a genetic problem that is made worse by autism. If the child’s parents have trouble reading or have been treated for other vision problems, it’s likely that the child needs help, too.
The Irene Method is a good way to treat problems with how people see things. This way uses colour to make the world more in tune with itself. If anyone has ever told you to put a colour filter over the page you’re reading so you can read better and faster, you may have heard of these ways. This method has been shown to work, and if your autistic child is old enough to read, you might want to try these colour filters to see if they make a difference in how fast they read and how well they understand what they are reading. But your autistic child is more likely to benefit from colour screens all day long, not just when reading. To solve this problem, coloured lenses have been put in special glasses. Not every child reacts the same way to every colour, so it takes some trial and error to figure out which colour blocks the dangerous light. You can also use coloured light bulbs in your home to help people with autism who have trouble seeing with their eyes.
This approach helps kids most in four areas: understanding depth, getting along with others, learning, and staying healthy. The colours help the child figure out how far away an item is, and the world looks more three-dimensional, which helps the child understand distance. Social skills also get better because the child feels like he or she is in a quieter world and can see and understand facial expressions better. The colours help the child learn, especially when reading, and the child will feel better generally because headaches and dizziness will be less of a problem. You can help your child with autism deal with the world and his or her autism better by trying this and other ways to help with visual awareness problems.
