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INTRODUCTION

When it comes to being a new teacher, there’s probably nothing more frightening and overwhelming than facing a room full of children with autism, all under the age of ten.

Trust me. I lived it.

During those first few weeks, I would have given my right hand—the one I squeezed my stress ball with—in exchange for any kind of accessible, teacher-friendly material. Every book I picked up was either an overwhelming, science-journal-type of tome or a book full of therapy-style exercises designed exclusively for one-on-one instruction. These resources are valuable in their own way, but when you’re a new teacher faced with the daunting task of managing and teaching a classroom of autistic students, you have precious little time or energy to process complicated, science-based articles or plan one-on-one lessons.

I think that teachers in autism classrooms should receive as much easy-to-process, no nonsense help as possible. I created my own material, honing and fine-tuning it as I came to understand my students and their highly specific needs. This program, which includes worksheets and scripted lessons, was effective with my students, so I thought I’d share it with other teachers.

However, this is not to say that this is a one-size-fits-all curriculum. You should be aware that lower-functioning kids may have trouble with the more conceptual aspects of these lessons, such as “wh” questions, prepositional phrases, directional words, adjectives, feeling words, and prompts that require subjective thinking (e.g., “Tell me about the cat.”). Many may also lack the organizational skills to copy from the board and transfer words from one paper to another. That’s okay. Take it one step at a time, and structure the lessons as needed to foster success for your students.

I hope this manual helps you and your students not only to manage but also to learn and grow in productive, fun ways.