Hi, I'm Dr. Hackie Reitman, Welcome to another
episode of exploring different brains and
today, we're so lucky to have returning to
us, my friend, who's a professor at Adelphi.
He's on the board of autism speak. He is the
man in autism. Stephen Shore. Stephen welcome.
Oh! Thank you, It's great to be here, Good
to be back again, I think for the third time.
Yeah, you are the leading contender here,
like it. Now look, you're at Adelphi right?
Oh well, I actually.. I teach at Aldelphi
but like all of us, we are confined to our
homes.
Is that why you have the "H" is it for home,
on your hat?
Exactly.
(Laughs.) You're good, you're really good.
You know I'm familiar with your journey, but
why don't you..why don't we start out, letting
our audience know about some of the highlights
of your fantastic journey.
The journey starts at the beginning after
24 hours of age. There was a baby picture
of me and my wife says, "I look like an egg."
Then things develop pretty typically, in the
first 18 months, where I then was struck with
the regressive autism bomb. And that happens
about 30% of us on the spectrum and I lost
functional communication, had meltdowns and
proof in the environment and in brief that
I became a pretty autistic little kid. It
was so little known about autism in those
days that it took my parents a whole year
to find a place for diagnosis and when they
did, the doctor's said that they never seen
such a sick child and they recommended institutionalization.
Unfortunately, my parents like we see so many
parents today, they advocated on my behalf
and convinced the school to take me in about
a year. And it was during that year that my
parents implemented what we would today refer
to as an intensive home-based Early Intervention
Program and it was the program emphasizing
music, movement, sensory integration, narration
and imitation. So, it probably looks like
one of the most developmental approaches we
have today, Such as Miller method or floor
time or RDI and with the work that my parents
did, speech began to return at age 4. I got
admitted to the school that I initially rejected
me, I got re-evaluated. Instead of being considered
a psychotic and ready for an institution,
I got upgraded to neurotic so things were
looking better. And I know you said something
Hackie but you’re nonverbal at this point.
Mazel tov! (Laughs.)
Ah! Thank you, thank you! My parents, well
at age 4, they found me taking apart a watch
with a sharp knife. I extract the motor, take
off the gears, play with them and spin them
around I like things like that spin, then
put them back together and the watch still
work and there weren't any pieces left over.
The lines of demarcation between ability and
disability that autism can bring to us are
really sharply defined. One of the worst experiences
I can have in school other than bullying would
be to walk into a classroom with a paragraph
on the board because that meant we were going
to have to copy it down. And by the end of
the class period, I’d gotten through a few
words and everybody else had gone to recess.
Well now we jump up to middle and high school
you don't need to be autistic to have difficulties
in middle and high school. But for me it was
actually easier because I was able to engage
in my focused interests of music and music
was great for being a structured activity
to mediate my interactions with others. I
got so tied up in music that I got it into
my autistic head that I needed to learn how
to play all the instruments, every last one
of them. So I’d spend hours in the instrument
closet, figuring them out and while I didn't
get all of them down, I did get it up to about
15 then when I heard that a requirement for
a degree in music education was that you had
to learn all the instruments so what could
be better than that. So, then it was off to
college and I studied Music Education, it
was the greatest thing I felt like I could
do. I had a good time, the bullies were gone,
I had more friends, I wanted to ride my bicycle
at midnight, I can find someone just as strange
as I was to also ride at midnight. Dating
occurs in college and that was something that
I always found confusing never could quite
figure it out but I've been married for a
little over 30 years now so I don't have to
worry about that. Well then it was on to graduate
school, where I continued my studies in music,
then started a doctorate in Music Education
and I completed all the coursework in that
doctorate they started getting more interested
in autism. So I defected to the school of
special education, got my doctorate in special
education focusing on autism, I started writing
books and traveling around the world talking
about autism and got a job as a professor
at Adelphi University teaching courses mostly
in autism but in special education in general.
So the pre-pandemic, so before March…I was
visiting a different country about once a
month [8:54] "Autism". I had gotten up through
51 countries, 52 I'm not sure that will be,
but when it becomes safe to travel I think
a Philippians are pretty high up there and
being one of the contenders for being number
52. And so, here I am, where I divide my time,
mostly teaching courses relating to autism,
mostly. And some in special education researching
about autism, at the university. Also writing
books, articles related to autism and well
I was traveling but now I'm sitting in front
of this computer probably in via Zoom, and
still presenting in a number of different
countries and different states in the United
States. And then finally giving music lessons
to autistic children and that's what brings
me here.
Fascinating history you have and now that
you're teaching others at Adelphi, tell us
what your observations have been regarding
how the coronavirus times we now have thrust
upon us, how they've affected you and how
they've affected your students.
Oh well it is a big challenge, it affects
me, it affects my students, it affects the
people who are present above. To the educators,
the parents and others can support autistic
individuals. What comes to mind immediately
is what I call "the big three" and those big
three are supporting autistic individuals
is one, you've got to keep to keep the routines
the same as much as possible. So you keep
routines the same and of course, you've got
to modify the ones that you have to as similar
as possible. So one example might be, the
autistic person who goes to school or goes
to work, either one. The morning routine is
all the same from getting out of bed, having
breakfast and then things change when it's
time to travel to school or to work whether
it's driving or by bus, or walking or whatever
it is and that's when we start making changes.
The 8:30 for example and it's time to catch
that bus and maybe you have a nice picture
schedule that has a picture of a yellow school
bus, That's how you get into school. Why you
have to exchange that from picture of say
a desk that in a room in a house… you got
to have a picture of that. And you make a
big deal about walking from wherever that
student was. Maybe in the den watching TV
while waiting after breakfast whatever it
is going from there to school and now that
we're in school, also keeping the school's
schedules as close as possible. So, most…most
classes begin, I should say most school days
begin with some sort of attendance taken.
Common layouts in schools have all the students
that sit in a semi-circle near a wall and
on that wall, is a big poster of a home and
another poster in school. Each child is called
upon and recognized maybe that child gets
up and pulls their picture off of the poster
at school and the nice satisfying tear sound
that you get and when you use velcro and you
walking over to a picture of school and you
just attach it to school. Or we could have
a similar thing at home where we go from whatever
the student was living room, dining room,
bedroom, kitchen to the desk where they're
doing the day’s, learning and that open
circle, opening Circle. Well, maybe the parents
and other siblings get in on it too and their
by replicating what's happening at school.
Schools also tend to have a mid-morning snack,
lunch. Whatever the other activities and classes
that they teach…and we reverse the process
so that's an example of the first of the big
three that is routines, keeping them the same
or as similar as possible. The second one
is communication and we touched on that a
little bit where we communicate in the style
that their child best understands. So, if
that means using a picture schedule than that's
what you use. If it's using words like were
talking now, that's what we also the use,
so communication piece. And then finally is
the self-care peace and this is for Hackie
and it’s for everybody else who takes care
of an autistic person and it can also be for
autistic people as well, who can learn to
do various things in order to keep themselves
calm in this time of heightened anxiety. So,
what can we do to keep ourselves calm? Maybe
it's just as simple as taking in a deep breath
and thinking about inhaling come from the
environment and when you exhale, your exhaling
stress and anxiety or another option might
be to as you breathe in, you make a fist with
your hands and then when you breathe out,
you let your hands relax and you spread it
out spread them out you do this three or four
times, You’re going to be more relaxed.
You can even take it one step further with
when you breathe in, you put your hands together,
palms facing each other and the way that some
people pray and then when you breathe out,
you pull the hands apart. So those are the
big three that come into mind when it comes
to coping during these challenging times and
certainly had to make adjustments to my own
schedules.
Well, The Big Three certainly makes a lot
of sense, certainly does. What is your biggest
present challenge teaching?
My biggest challenge now is making sure that
I reach all the students in an interactive
manner. My teaching tends to be very interactive
which is different than doing a more didactic
presentation because I realized and I could
talk about this too, I realized that students
like back and forth conversation more than
just being lectured to. And that was something
I discovered about…I think about a couple
of years into teaching at Aldephi because
what I found is that when I walked into the
classroom, students, most of the students
were already there, they were all talking
to each other and it seemed like they were
engaging in excessive and Grotius social Interaction.
And it was really loud, It would hurt my ears
and warned them to quiet down right away but
you know, I just kind of put up with it until
it was time to start class and then the student
would quiet down really quickly and I could
get on with my lecture and pretty Power points
and so on and everybody would go home happy
or at least I hoped they did. However, one
day I decided to just listen, what are these
students talking about anyways before class
started? And I found that they were talking
about the course material which made me realize
that maybe they want to maybe…maybe they
prefer to have more discussion and as long
as our discussion covered all the material
that I wanted to cover anyways, then let's
spend more time talking about it instead of
being lectured to about it.
How can people find out more about what you
do, Stephen?
Well, one way is to go to my website, Which
is; www.dr.stephenshore.com.  I also have
a number of videos on YouTube, Facebook, and
also my LinkedIn account.
That's great. Is there anything Stephen today
that we have not covered that you would like
to cover?
Well, I've been involved in this interesting
project called "Learn Autism" which is a video
portal for supporting parents and providing
research-based-information in bite sized video
chunks. So you may want to check out learnautism.com. I've
got some videos there and many other people
have videos there and what we do is we explore
all kinds of areas related to autism, the
words, educational strategies, maybe it's
inclusions, sensory issues, navigating transitions
to adulthood in the areas of employment, continuing
education for those of us who are going to
college, relationships and sexuality, how
we’re going to be living -- residential
issues. And just about everything else you’ll
find there as well.
Professor Stephen Shore what is one piece
of advice you would have for an autistic individual
during these unique coronavirus times?
My advice for us autistic people during these
uncertain times is to focus on your strengths,
focus on your abilities, and how can you use
those abilities in which to be a better student
or perhaps, find employment, and to bring
yourself joy in life.
Well Stephen, It's been a pleasure to have
you here, good luck with all your teaching
at Aldelphi and thanks for being a leader
as a self-advocate and teaching autism, about
autism, and how to help all of us. Thank you
very much Stephen Shore.
Well thank you.
