I also think you could write an entire gender studies textbook about the dynamics of ABA.
I mean, quite a lot of the time it boils down to a bunch of young, idealistic women trying to control the bodies of little boys--and getting bizarrely affronted when the boys resist.
16 December, 2011
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
I find this fascinating and would be curious to hear more of your thoughts about it.
ReplyDeleteI also think part of the problem is the adults/young children divide. To me the idea of teaching any child the "right" way to play, as though there were only one right way, is appalling, but it's especially so when we consider that this is (non-autistic) adults dictating to (autistic) children how they should play. WTF does an adult truly know about children's play? It just seems so contrived and icky to me.
In addition to Sarah's comments about play, I'd like to point out that play is probably a big part of how we learn and figure out the world. So by interfering with autistic childrens' play, we're interfering with how they learn and figure out the world.
ReplyDeleteThat and autistic children have as much right to have fun as anybody else.