School gives a glimpse of class activities for Autism Awareness Day
By ANDREW SERBA
April 02, 2009 3:56 PM


CAPTION: Armaan, 3, the youngest student at New Haven Learning Centre for autistic children, builds a train track under the watchful eyes of Shannon Wilkinson, clinical co-ordinator and Marni Binder Byk, director of development. It took a month for him to lear to do the task alone. The centre has one instructor for each student, and tailors students’ educational plans to their individal needs.


Taking a break from playing basketball, Sean Hazey, 14, lists the friends he’s made at school. There are five or six he’s had for a while and a few new ones to add. He remembers to tell his teacher that a family matter will keep him from attending school one day next week. He jokes about his favorite class; “It would be Spelling,” if he had to pick one, but he would rather not, he laughs.

That Hazey sounds like a regular student who can carry a conversation, has a sense of humor and is sociable, is a wonder to his mother, Susan Elworthy. At two-and-a-half years old Hazey was diagnosed with autism, a disorder that affects communication and social-interaction skills.

Hazey did not do well in the public school system. He was well behaved and very quiet, but did not socialize and sat passively in class while material “went right over his head,” his mother said. She realized her son had to “learn how to learn” and would need special help to do so.

After four years at the New Haven Learning Centre, an Etobicoke-based not-for-profit learning centre for children with autism, Elworthy has seen a change in her son she describes as “remarkable.”

“Now he’s a lovely, friendly kid with a great sense of humour and people who meet him like him,” Elworthy said.

New Haven was founded in 1998 to help children at any point along the autism spectrum integrate into social situations. The centre currently has 40 students ranging in age from three to 17.

Audrey Meissner, the clinical director at New Haven, said the centre uses a scientific teaching method called Applied Behaviour Analysis (ABA). It’s a method she wanted to draw attention to on April 2 for Autism Awareness Day. With ABA, instructors set measurable goals for their students and chart their progress. If a method does not result in measurable progress for a student, it is changed until it works.

“Every student has their own, individualized educational plan,” Meissner said. “We take data everyday on everything that we are teaching.”

The work at the centre is labour intensive; New Haven has a one-to-one ratio of students to instructors. In addition to regular academic subjects, students receive instruction on every day-to-day task they need to accomplish. A mock kitchen and laundry room allow instructors to teach household chores. Another classroom is set up as a bedroom and in a traditional classroom students learn to study in a social setting. One instructor teaches the class while others - one for every student, monitor the students’ behaviour and offer individual help when it is needed.

The centre’s goal is to integrate their students into social settings. They want their students to be able to function in a public school, at home, or in a workplace, Meissner said.

Suzanne Lanthier is the executive director for Autism Speaks Canada. The organization funds autism research and provides outreach for families with autistic children. She sends her son to New Haven and believes that while ABA may not work for all autistic students, it is “one of the best treatments” available.

“It is the treatment with the most science behind it right now,” she said.

It is also a treatment that is growing in demand. Ten years ago one in 10,000 children were diagnosed with autism - a diagnosis now made for one in every 150, Lanthier said.

“We are getting better at diagnosing,” she pointed out. “But that doesn’t account for all of it.”

With no direct government funding, New Haven survives on tuition and fundraising. Tuition at the school is $57,848. Some families receive help through the Autism Initiative run by the Ministry of Children and Youth Services. Others have the cost of the tuition defrayed or covered by the centre. New Haven raises over $500,000 a year it is able to distribute as subsidies to families based on need.

For Elworthy and her son, it’s tough to put a price on results.

“Friends who haven’t seen him in a while are blown away by the progress he’s made,” she said. “Every couple of months you can see a change.”