Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Twice Exceptional Captain Literal Strikes Again

Ok, so this is more of a request for advice on how to communicate more literally to my 12 year old with Asperger's traits (but not diagnosed as of yet - psychologist wants to do further testing, exploring first). How do you train yourself to communicate in a way that lessens frustrations for both me and my kiddo?

Secondly, is it possible to teach a child who is so literal to learn to extrapolate out to more generalized conclusions.

Here's an example from last night:

Me, calling upstairs to the 12-year-old: Can you please check your brother's room and all around upstairs to see if he has any plates or cups or anything that needs to go in the dishwasher. Bring them down if there are.

Him: Nope. He doesn't have anything upstairs.

Me: There HAS to be dishes up there. There are only two bowls in the entire kitchen.

Him: Oh. Well, I have a bunch of bowls up here from when I had popcorn with my friends.

Me: Well, then, bring them down.

Him: Oh. Ok. I can do that.

It never occurred to him that if there were dishes, bring them down. He latched onto the "if your brother has dishes" and never went beyond that. While it can be humorous, it is also really frustrating for his teachers, for me, etc., and yet I know it is just the way he thinks. If anyone has advice or suggestions, I'm all ears. Ok, eyes.

Maybe make your instructions/communications broad rather than narrow so that no extrapolation is required?

This reminds me of broad and narrow claims in patent applications.

Having just gone through patent and trademarking adventures, I can see your point. It is worth a try to be more broad.

Maybe make it a statement as well, instead of "Can you?".

When mine was 6, I said "Would you please feed the dog?" and he responded "Wait, are you asking me or telling me?". I said I was telling him in a very nice way.

And, I agree about broad in some cases "Check the upstairs for dirty dishes and bring down any you find". But, in some cases, I have to be very specific. Once I said to him, bring me all the towels from your bathroom so that I can wash them. He did just that - ALL the towels, clean and dirty. To me, it was clear that I would only want to wash dirty ones, but to him, that "all" meant everything.

If there are ideas to help mine learn to extrapolate or generalize, I would appreciate that as well. As in your example, from "check the upstairs for dirty dishes and bring them to me" he would see a dirty cup in the living room and automatically pick it up and bring it as well.

And, yes, very frustrating here as well.

ABQ, mine had that idea about "dishes" too! (That it was just plates, and glasses and bowls were not included.)

We do direct, on-the-spot, one-sentence instruction when we catch one of these misunderstandings: "When I say "dishes," I mean all the eating utensils, including your glass and cutlery."

Mine also had trouble with implied instructions: he regards "Class, we are on page 43" as information that doesn't apply to him, but if you say "turn to page 43" he is more likely to do it.

I suspect each instance of this kind of semi-figurative language has to be taught: it's a language glitch and a thinking glitch. Having teachers watch out for it and instruct as needed may at least get everyone on the same page.

DeeDee

Maybe try switching from action-oriented instructions to outcome-oriented instructions. Empower them to figure out how to achieve the outcome.

Like: "Please make sure all the bowls are in the kitchen by 6pm"

Thanks for all the suggestions - and for letting me know I'm not alone in this one.

I have aspergers, so maybe I just don't get it, but why do people speak soooooo indirectly to kids? Its like some wierd test all the time. Today someone said to DS "we don't like to climb on there." he said "ok," with great delecacy, and gave her a wierd look. So I told him what she meant, and told her why he didn't understand her. And then she said to him "we aren't allowed to climb on that."

so he told me I'd misunderstood her, and that they weren't allowed to climb it, but it was all good, since he was allowed , nd they dont like to anyway.

Arrrrrrgh.

Anyway, no suggestions. Half the time I'm mystified.

I have always talked to DS4 very directly. I think my mind works in many ways just like his (sometimes I wonder if his Asperger-like traits come from me?) ... I take things literally first too and then I have to MAKE myself understand things the way others do. So to me it's been a natural thing to talk to him very directly ... I've had some friends tell me I talk to my son like he was a dog ... And I just tell them ... maybe ... but IT WORKS! ... I just use a lot of DOs and DON'Ts and direct verbs and it seems to do the trick. He won't follow 2-step commands someone gives him, he won't even follow 1-step commands many times ... but if I translate the multiple-step command into our private "dog language" he WILL do what's asked of him.

Now, obviously, I am not comparing my son to an animal ... don't take me wrong! But it is that simple direct kind of language that he responds to the best! He has an amazing vocabulary that he uses but I can't use it back on him. I have to keep it simple.

LOl I agree! And I do not have aspergers! But I feel like there is a certain way of communicating in upper middle class white suburbia that is very indirect. Kids learn it young (like someone mentioned speaking very indirectly eg "we don't like to climb on there") and then do it as adults. I come from lower class working poor... I *think* "we" are much more direct (for example I don't think anyone from my hood would say "we don't like to climb on there" to a child, it would have been "Hey there ! Whoa! Get down here right now! You're not allowed to climb on there - you'll get hurt" No one would have ever said, with the fake smile, "we don't like to climb on that."

My husband, upper middle class white suburban boy, often chuckles at me and my directness and says "Okay babe that is NOT how we say things here in white suburbia..." and then will give me examples of how to say the same thing very indirectly. I rarely have the patience for it. And being direct in upper middle class surburbia has indeed gotten me in trouble (and called 'offensive'). And I am not mean - I don't hurl personal insults or anything, I am just direct.

My MIL (is a very nice lady that I love, btw, so not bashing here) is the queen of indirect. An example I find amazing (it truly can be an art, imo) : Father in law was in hospital (major operation); nurse comes in and starts taking vial after vial of blood out of FIL; MIL KNOWS this is wrong; concerned she says to nurse "oh my! that's quite bit you seem to be taking there. Are you sure that's okay for him?" Nurse blows her off; MIL (having no doubt nurse is making a mistake) then goes to head nurses station and EXCHANGES pleasentries with head nurse first and then mentions to head nurse, "oh I sure hope my husband can go on his walk around the hall this afternoon." Head nurse says "why wouldn't he be able to?" or something like that; MIL says "well that new nurse over there is taking an awful lot of blood out of him and I am afraid he'll be too weak to take his walk." Head nurse freezes and says "WHAT!?!" and then runs to nurse making the mistake to stop him. (turns out nurse had never checked FIL bracelet and had him confused with a different patient). I found my MIL's way to deal with that postively amazing! I mean, that style really isn't for me but still amazing.

I'm actually just commiserating... my own ds12 isn't Asperger's, but on the big spectrum, he and my ITguy dh are certainly to one side of the middle.
Last year I asked him multiple times why an online grade was zero... he kept insisting that he handed the paper in. Finally I emailed the teacher, who called me that night to say that she had indeed found the paper, lost in a pile. However, she added that she had been asking him for three days, "Do you have that paper?" "Grades are due soon, are you sure you don't have that paper?" Each time, he would respond "no," but at no time did he think to add, "Because I handed it in." When I asked him WHY, he said, "She didn't ask if I handed it in. She asked if I had it. I didn't have it, because I had already handed it in." It actually can look snarky or sarcastic at times when he responds that way, but it's truly just him being his literal self.
SIGH...
I think dh has trained himself to "decode" what people want and how to respond (even to add in emotion, lol, which is hard for both of them) but I don't think it comes naturally. They are both SOOO smart at many things, but at catching nuances and such, not at all.
I try to tell all of ds's teachers, "Please be explicit. Please don't make him infer stuff. Please write it down if possible," and I also have a lot of discussions with ds that start out, "okay, tell me exactly what s/he said..." (that's where having a great memory comes in handy :)).
Dh encourages me because he is so much like ds, but he has really successfully learned to broaden his communication style- both what he says and what he hears, if that makes sense. I just try to think about what I'm saying, and unlike some others have said, I find that being broad doesn't really work with my ds. He gets flustered if there is any interpretation to be done, so very specific directions work best for him. If I can hand him a list, all the better. I know that doesn't help for quick "go get these dishes" types of conversations, but it might work well for longer chores. We make to-do lists for everyone each weekend and we have a family meeting every Sunday, which helps.
I also find that he can't make the, "and so...." leap. You can say, "how much homework do you have this weekend, because we are busy all day Sunday" but he won't hear the implied, "so do it Saturday." You can say, "I'm going to the library during the day today" and he won't hear "do you need any books?" I have to be very explicit. I actually think in my head, "and so..." and I teach him to both think that and say that. It is a skill that can be taught to a certain extent...
Good luck You definitely aren't alone!

I shouldn't laugh at this, but it IS funny. You're right--people say the weirdest stuff to kids. WE don't like to? Okay, lady, but *I* like to.

I'm wondering whether to push back a bit on this one with the teacher:

The class was talking about the bartering system that was used in America (we live in the Southwest where it was settled long before the east coast) in the 1600's, and the teacher said, "And imagine if you had an iPhone what it might be worth, and that people would bid on it higher and higher ..."

My son interjected, "Actually if you had a functioning iPhone in the 1600's, which is an impossibility in itself, they would probably think you were a witch and would execute you in the one of the ways they did witches in the 1600's, like burning at the stake."

The class laughed and the teacher pulled my son aside and told him he shouldn't be disruptive and needed to focus on the concepts being taught more.

My son told me about what happened today and said he still didn't understand why the teacher was mad, why the kids laughed at what he said, or why the teacher would think he needed to focus when what he was talking about was very focused...

ARGHHHH

ABQ, the thing that is striking to me is that by this point in the year, the teachers should know your DS well enough to know that this kind of thing happens. I mean, they all have copies of his IEP, you've introduced him and his issues to all of them.

However, I also get it that this is the point in the year where some teachers lose their patience because they realize that our kids won't be "fixed" by their hard work in the course of a year. Our experience is that the teachers get burned out on DS around now. Shouldn't happen, does.

Still, it's disappointing that she's not willing to redirect him in a way that doesn't make him a laughingstock. *That* part I would discuss with her, for sure.

DeeDee

DeeDee - you are right. The "I-can't-fix-your-kid" fatigue is kicking in. I'm seeing it in all of his classes.

If the kids were laughing AT him, I'd be concerned. The problem for the teacher is that they see my son as a leader who is wonderfully funny and doesn't have a problem poking a stick at authority. They kids were laughing, because they thought my son was giving the teacher a hard time.

And that is the challenge - trying to make a teacher understand that the laughing and perceived disrespect and challenge of authority are absolutely side effects of very different motives on my son's part.

I'm with your son on this one! Who comes up with a lame example like an iPhone in the 1600's? You can't even begin to run the scenario in your mind without running into comical absurdities. No cell phone towers! No internet! NO ONE ELSE WITH A PHONE!

I teach at the university level, and I get push-back all the time on hypothetical examples I come up with. I either change my example to better fit the point I'm trying to make, or I laugh and say "C'mon, work with me, people!"

This is the teacher's fault from start to finish: 1) careless thinking on her part; 2) blaming a student for engaging in critical thought; 3) total failure of crowd-control skills; and 4) blaming the student again for #3.

The irony here is that your son is exactly the kind of kid we love to see in a college classroom, even if they need to learn to not sharpen their teeth on every passing side-issue. I see this type all the time, and they're the ones I have great hope for.

If your child is interjecting with an observation that is clearly topical, then I'm at a loss to understand what, precisely, the teacher is trying to fix. Is being engaged a problem?

It so happens that DD8 is homeschooling, and DW has punted social studies to me. DD makes interjections like this all the time, and I handle it by laughing and saying, "Good point," and moving on... unless it happens to be an interesting line of digression, in which case, we explore it.

He's quite right.

My son would have the same problem, and probably for the same reason. If she actually said "focus on the concepts being taught", then the problem is that she wants him to think about the big picture of the bartering system, and he is thinking about the details of what she is teaching, which is the iPhone. He perfectly well thinks he's paying attention to the teaching, but she's on another page altogether!

She should definitely know this by this point in the school year.

Exactly. A modicum of thinking on the teacher's part would have turned the situation around and shown the teacher in a positive light while respecting your son's insightful point.

My middle school son would have said the same thing to her OR would have had a mild ranting session about it at home afterwards that I would have had the benefit of "enjoying".