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Autism and English as foreign language

NAS65198

Hi, 

I am a father of a 15 year old boy with autism. My boy is very fond of languages and different accents. His mothertounge is Swedish but he surprises me being very good at English, and has a quite big vocabulary. I have always encouraged his interest and have been having conversations with him in English just for fun. His language skill is kind of funny as he himself has otherwise big communication problems. Sometimes it feels as if it is easier fo him with a second language.

I would like to help him even more learning English and is therefore looking for a company/organisation in the UK that arranges language courses (1-2 weeks) for children with autism. I’ve been Googeling but haven’t found anything. Does anybody know of such a organiser of language courses?

Best regards,

Niclas
Sweden

  • Sadly not, but I am also Autistic with all of the social communication problems, yet have a degree in modern foreign languages. Some of us us have a flare for the patterns in language, even if we miss the social content of conversation. Communicating in a foreign language can some times be easier socially. Make a mistake and everyone just thinks you are sweet for trying, as opposed to rude for not getting the social part.

    Hope you find a good tutor to help your lad. Do you know any English people living in Sweeden who might be able to tutor him over coffee or a burger?

  • It is great that your son is interested in languages and has a good command of English. I'm not aware of any specific language courses for children with autism. Still, there are definitely plenty of options out there for language learning. Here are a few ideas: Many online courses and teaching resources can be used for language learning. Some of these are designed for children with autism or other learning disabilities. There are also summer camps and programs that focus on language learning. These might be a good option for your son.

  • It's great that you are encouraging your son's interest in languages!

  • in reply to NAS78945

    In my case, I was repeating the Spanish words to my autistic daughter every day, and even put some sentencest and words written on paper around the house, and made a kind of game when she needed to find these words translate them, and in that case, I rewarded her with things she likes. It worked for me, and you can try this, I hope it will help you.

  • Yes, I agree; learning a new language for an autistic person can be really hard. In my situation, I solved this by repeating the foreign words simultaneously.

  • for me worked becoming addicted to RPGs, 30 years ago in Poland you could get rulebooks in english only, so I had to learn to understand it, others, who played with me were less inclined

  • in reply to NAS78794
    NAS78794 said:
    learn words from dictionaries

    and grammar

    I am doing that since I was 15

    I had only basic english, russian and german for 2 years when I was in secondary

    it's a lot easier when they have similar grammar, like polish, slovak and czech

    most difficult for me is to understand spoken languages since I have somekind of speech recognition problem

    but I have english friend now, and I told him to correct my inproper pronunciations, but he didn't notice many during those years we know each other.

  • I find really difficult to teach my autistic child a foreign language. That works perfectly for him is to learn words from dictionaries. I tried different sources, teachers, and ways to make him learn, but nothing worked out. I simply give him a dictionary and daily he learns a few words. Slow progress is still progress.

    Good luck!