It’s so exciting when there is a new breakthrough with
one of our pupils. In the clip below with Jo, Lucy starts to use communicative
gesture for the first time. Gesture is just one of the channels of non-verbal
communication (NVC) and NVC makes up 80% of the communication package. It is
well known that autistic folks struggle to pick up NVC and so is easy to see
how difficult it can be for them to understand others when they are missing 80%
of the communicative intent that someone else is sharing with them.
Since Lucy started with us in September 2015, we have
seen progress towards and then mastery of the developmental milestones of
social referencing, experience-sharing, joint attention (responding and
initiating), episodic memory and joint engagement. The upshot of this is that
the quality of Lucy’s emotional connection to and understanding of her
communication partner has increased exponentially. As a result, when the
guiding framework/guided participation relationship is round her, her social
reciprocity and enjoyment of her own feelings of competence and togetherness
with her partner is a joy to watch.
Let’s just remind ourselves how far Lucy has come. Here
is a clip of her presentation shortly after she joined us at Bright FuturesSchool and before she had taken part in any guiding (derived from RDI).
Here we can see that Lucy is resisting my attempts to
co-regulate (do things together in a communicatively synchronised way) and is
seeking to be on her own agenda….running up and down making noises rather than
co-regulating by joining hands for the actions of a nursery rhyme or walking
across the room in parallel.
RDI/guiding is based on research that shows that
the autistic preference for one’s own agenda is driven by the difficulties
autistic peeps have in managing uncertainty and unpredictability. For Lucy at
this time, I am far too unpredictable and uncertain and so she avoids engaging
with me. A perfectly natural human response – it’s what we all tend to do initially
when we are faced with an unpredictable challenge or a novel situation, except
that non-autistic folk have mastered the developmental milestones and encoded
the episodic memories of successfully overcoming challenges within the guiding
relationship. This enables them to
manage and enjoy uncertainty, unpredictability and challenge.
In the clip below with Jo from the beginning of March
2018, Lucy’s progress with social communication and interaction (and her newly
emerging use of gesture) is plain to see.
The text to this clip is narrated by Learning Mentor Jo,
who is working with Lucy. The comments in blue are feedback from school’s
external RDI Consultant, Sharon, whose job it is to make sure we are keeping
the guiding framework around Lucy so that she can step into her co-regulatory
role and take advantage of the opportunities to master the milestones she has missed.
Jo’s footage commentary
0.07 I remove distractions and use facial expression to
express “No eating”
0.10 We have been taking turns at stirring so I use
non-verbal communication to wonder whose turn it is. Lucy social references me (looks
to Jo to check Jo's understanding of her communicative intent, Ed)
0.13 Lucy social references and uses gesture herself by
pointing to herself to answer my question. This is the first time we have seen
Lucy use gesture - so exciting! I nod and Lucy takes the green spoon for herself
0.17 Lucy chooses to also add the purple spoon for me (how
lovely! - thinking about her communication partner’s needs)
0.19 I use non-verbal communication to ask what the spoon
is for. Lucy social references me to check her understanding of my
communicative intent. Agree - I also think there is a little bit of study
response from Lucy as she sort of looks down before pointing to you as if
thinking about what to do here. Study response = pausing to think about
something before acting (Ed)
0.21 Lucy uses gesture to point to me for me to use the
spoon, stirring together Great to see
0.24 Lucy says (really quietly) “Jo have the purple spoon”
- clarifying that she wants to stir together. Here she social refs to see if
you understood her or if she needs to do more – she is really taking on board
her communicative responsibility here
0.28 I spotlight her thoughtfulness verbally
0.30 I use gesture. Lucy looks at my thumbs up but then
becomes distracted by her thoughts. I think maybe she doesn't know what
to make of the thumbs up in the situation, I could be wrong?!?!?
0.34 I answer Lucy’s query
0.36 I spotlight and add an emotion and label how I am
feeling (following recent feedback) Jo I think this acts as a nice spotlight
for Lucy, she looks happy
0.47 I start a chant just as Lucy starts to say “need….” –
showing she is thinking about what we need next. Here too she appears to be
using study response.
0.52 Lucy verbalises “Jo get the baking tray”
0.54 I use non-verbal communication to spotlight her
great planning
1.00 Lucy says “Jo get a case” This is lovely! The whole
interaction is at a lovely pace that enables Lucy to really think about what is
going on & have more agency (influence over what is happening between you
in thought & action)
1.02 I use non-verbal communication to give Lucy the opportunity
to communicate
1.03 Lucy uses gesture to answer my question Love it!
1.04 I leave to get the baking tray, I set limits
1.13 Lucy chooses to ignore the limits and scoffs a spoonful
of the mixture! She appeared to think about this beforehand!
1.21 Lucy looking sheepish, knowing she had tasted the
mixture
1.24 Lucy verbalises and uses gesture (pointing from the
mixture to the tray) Brilliant - this is allowing Lucy to do even more problem
solving!
1.27 Lucy acknowledges the next step: showing her
independence and initiative, she social references whilst pointing to the
cupboard where they are kept
1.29 I use non-verbal communication to spotlight Lucy’s
competence
1.32 Lucy verbally communicates for me to get it
1.34-1.43 I am trying to use non-verbal communication to
express to Lucy that I don’t know where the cases are in order to give Lucy the
opportunity to help and be independent. Lucy verbalises “Jo get the case” 3
more times
1.42 I scaffold and verbally communicate as my attempts
at NVC aren’t working Agree she needed this
1.49 I scaffold with “maybe we could look together….” and
Lucy finishes my sentence “….for the case”
1.54 I use gesture (holding my hand out) to invite her
find the cases together, Lucy joins me
1.59-2.06 I give Lucy the opportunity to find the cases
and feel competent Good to see
2.08 I spotlight using non-verbal communication. I use
thumbs up - Lucy doesn’t know how to respond so high fives my thumb
2.10 Lucy shows acknowledgement in that I had my thumbs
up and walks back to the table mimicking my gesture (the first time I have
known her to do thumbs up herself) YES!!!!
2.13 Lucy starts to put the cases into the tray on her
own
2.16 I take control of the equipment (cases) and set up
the roles so that I can enable us to co-regulate our actions
2.19 Lucy glances at the cases I am holding, maybe in
response to them making a noise. I scaffold for the cases so that we can step
into a co-regulatory role
2.23 I use gesture
2.26 Lucy passes me the cases in response to my low
scaffold and non-verbal communication
2.30 I start our co-reg role set. Lucy accepts it and
steps into it without a scaffold
2.34 I use a slow pace, Lucy uses gesture and social
references for me to pass the case Looks good
2.37 Lucy says “flapjack” and I verbally answer her query
2.49 Lucy social references in response to my slow pace
and prosody maybe?
2.55 Lucy uses gesture (thumbs up) on her own initiative
to show she is ready. Wow!
2.57 I respond and return the gesture
2.58 Lucy social references and we are still in our co-reg
role
3.03 I use a slow pace and Lucy social references
3.09 Lucy social references, I pass
3.20 I pause, Lucy verbalises and social references (even
though we don’t have any white choc) I'm wondering if this was her way of
asking for it, or querying whether it would go in?
3.26 I use gesture, thumbs down to show no white choc Good
use of the opportunity
3.33 We step back into co reg pattern
3.36 Is this memory recall? I'm not sure that this isn't
a little resistance to the pace or the doing together???
3.39 I encourage experience-sharing by using non-verbal
communication to acknowledge I have heard her
3.41 Lucy looks to me to share experience
3.56 Lucy places the case down and then recalls one of
her memories again about Saoirse
4.01 Another memory recall, with Lucy concentrating on
her verbal communication and expanding her vocabulary. She then social references - maybe after a
response around her telling me her story? Interesting, I'm again not sure
if this is a form of resistance or if it could be that as the pace is slow it's
enabling her to think about other things. If this continues it might be a
good idea to say 'let's place the cases & then talk'. Then once
you've talked take it back to the co-reg & so on.
4.10 I use non-verbal communication
4.11 Lucy responds by using her own non-verbal
communication Jo this is great!
4.18 I use the thumbs up gesture. Lucy uses gesture to
point to the bowl of mixture
4.24 Lucy verbalises “green spoon”. I invite Lucy to
celebrate her competence with the co-reg role
Where to: This is definitely the way to move forward with
Lucy, to open up a whole world of communication that may actually start to
reduce her need for self-stimulatory actions, so more of the same on/off across
the day.
You may have to scaffold parts, as you have above around
tying the verbal meaning to the non- verbal communication you are using.
Think about whether there's a need to set boundaries
around off-topic talking (as it can become a distraction to your guiding goal) &
then think about how you can slot short intervals in for Lucy to talk about
off-topic things.
End of footage text.
It was lovely to share this at staff meeting last week
and was a good opportunity for staff to see exactly how Jo facilitated Lucy’s
NVC so that we can make sure as many staff as possible are able to have a go at
this across the school day.
I’ll end by highlighting one of Sharon’s comments: ‘The
whole interaction is at a lovely pace that enables Lucy to really think about
what is going on & have more agency (influence over what is happening
between you in thought & action)’
Increasing personal agency for the autistic person. That
is at the nub of what RDI is all about.