The Hidden Curriculum and the Autistic Student

Andrea Trafford, an ASD consultant from Kinark Child and Family Services, presented a workshop on how to help teachers understand the world of the autistic child. She highlighted how conventional, social rules need to be explicitly taught to autistic students. Moreover, she stressed the importance of how all traditions, rules and rituals that pertain to school, homelife, culture, community, workplace, relationship ettiquette and the legal system -- all need to be defined and directly taught to autistic students. Her workshop was insightful and a powerful reminder on how to help ASD students.