High Functioning Autism Spectrum Disorder

A Person-Centered Approach to High Functioning Autism Spectrum Disorder
The higher functioning (previously known as Asperger's Disorder) population of Autism Spectrum Disorders has recently received a great deal of attention. DSM-5® no longer diagnoses individuals as Asperger's Disorder or PDD-NOS; they are included in the broader Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) label. This presents significant changes to the way professionals diagnose and treat this population.

Mr. Kowalski teaches participants how to apply a person-centered approach to treating individuals on the higher end of the Autism Spectrum Disorder. Attendees will encounter the typical deficits seen in the domain of social-interaction and obtain intervention techniques to address tact, proxemics, social rules, egocentricity, naiveté, and jocularity. Obsessive interests, poor play skills, dislike of physical contact, and gullibility that are often associated with Autism Spectrum Disorder will be addressed. Expand your ability to treat social-communication deficits such as abuse of conversational rules, prosody, perseverative questioning, abstract reasoning, pedantic speech, and nonverbal communication skills. Enhance clients' emotional regulation with specific techniques designed to improve stress, anxiety, self-esteem, change, ritualism, and sensory overload, and how to recognize emotional states in themselves and others. In addition, this seminar offers extensive strategies to enhance the academic needs of the ASD client by focusing on seven core academic issues: initiating work assignments, increasing motivation, decreasing distraction, compensating for gross and fine motor deficits, adapting the curriculum, academic modifications, and increasing cognitive processing. Attendees will leave this seminar feeling empowered and ready to employ these techniques, resulting in improved outcomes and functional daily living.