Autistic + ADHD student.

[elisianna]

I have a fairly new student (have had him for a little over a month).  First time I met him I knew he had to have ADD or something, and his mom (who comes into the lessons) told me he was ADHD.  Last week she told me that he is also slightly autistic.

Now it's hard to keep the attention of young kids as it is, but this is even more difficult. (He actually is about 10...)  He picks things up quickly as anyone else, but it's hard to get him to pay attention and as soon as I stop making him play something he goes crazy and pounds away at the piano. 

My boss told me that he should never be doing an activity for more than 5 minutes.  I'm a pretty new teacher, so it's hard for me to come up with some other things we could do.  Does anybody have any suggestions?

Thanks in advance

[hyrst]

The most important thing you need to do is to establish a routine and stick to it!  This is useful for the ADHD and vital for the autistic spectrum disorders. 

You would probably start a losing battle if you try to prevent him from banging the piano.  This behaviour could be due to the need to move or some ritualistic type thing.  In either case, you need to identify the cause and deal with that instead of dealing with the banging.  If it is restlessness, always have some activity to move on to - something that involves moving, even give him something to hold in his hands in between pieces.  If it is ritualistic, you will only cause distress if you try to stop him doing it.

Before trying to speak to him and give him instructions, get eye contact (if he can handle it), but at least say his name and get a response before trying to give any further directions. 

Do not enter a battle of the wills - you will lose!

It is important that you have the lesson planned thoroughly in advance, so you have something to move onto every minute.  Keep things physically involved.  Sometimes it is useful to move back and forth from the piano - use stamping instead of clapping rhythms, etc.  Other times, this will mean you can't get attention back again for the rest of the lesson.  It will take some trial and error to find out what works for him.  You can use the same sorts of learning materials and activities as for other students, but give him something kinaesthetic to do whenever you stop to give instructions. 

Don't take the banging or other restlessness as a sign that he is not listening.  It could be quite the opposite - he might be moving even more because he is trying even harder to listen.  People with ADHD need to move in order to pay attention.  Assess his attention by the amount of learning, rather than the 'respect' he seems to be giving you.

Hope this helps a bit.
Annah

[jpianoflorida]

I have a friends son who is autistic, I have known them for about 10 years, he is now 18.        I am actually one of the few friends they have that he can stay with.   When he first started staying here overnight on occasion, he would freak out!   I learned that some of his behavior was from Stubborness and not all autism. Sometimes it's hard to tell.  He had to always sleep with the light on, he won't eat inside my house or anyone's house but his own....we had trouble getting him to brush his teeth(he had to go outside to do it).  He still sometimes can't eat in restaurants depending on what is on the wall.  If we could only know what is going on in that mind!   What I've found is that autistic children need a schedule.   He needs to know what time is the tv show, what time is dinner, what time does he take a bath, etc.    Actually have you seen rainman(movie)?   It's actually a very realistic potrayal of austism.      Ok, back to my friends son: I did try to teach him piano for a few years.   We had to say upfront how many times we were going to play each song.    Sometimes we numbers his fingers with stickers.   I was thinking that maybe piano was his "gift", but it wasn't! We tried everything, he never really wanted to play piano, but I learned a lot from him and still do.      I must say that now it's very easy when he's here..he will be here this weekend while my best friend and wife celebrate their anniversary.    I've learned how to deal with him, it's taken years but it's nice to now be able to handle it better.

[lilla]

I have several autistic  students and I thought I'd share some of the things that work.  Routine is everything.  I have a talented student  who had bogged down on note-reading.  We were spending months without progress.  I finally decided to dump that idea and move into being musical.  We start every lesson with a set of exercises - pentascales, triads, arpeggios, tetrachords, and finally, one-octave scales.  He can play in every key and now comes in, sits down, and demands that we play pentascales.  My focus is to get that theory into his fingers and head so that when he sits down to randomly play, he will fall back onto the theory he's learned.  So far so good.

Another aspect we're working on is rote playing.  Each week we work on a heavily patterned piece.  I play, he repeats.  Again, I'm expecting that these bits and pieces of learned music will surface when he sits down to play.

Finally, we work on a lesson assignment.  We have gone back to learning notes one by one - even though I feel he knows his notes.  He can read, but always asks for "help".  Somehow I have to instill confidence.  I know he can do it.  But he doesn't

I hope there will be more input on this subject as I am very keen to exchange ideas, successes, failures, etc.

[penguinlover]

This is so interesting!  I am thinking of starting with a severly handicapped girl, and I think she is autistic also.  I need to learn a lot before I begin teaching her.

[elisianna]

Thank you all very much =)

[jpianoflorida]

update:

found out today my friend's son that is autistic that I'm keeping this weekend is going thru a phase...   he is obsessed with disease of all kinds and having panic attacks that he is going to get something and die...wish me luck!    he goes thru these "phases" and they are always different, it's hard to pinpoint what triggers them.