Parenting Your Asperger Child: Individualized Solutions for Teaching Your Child Practical Skills [Mass Market Paperback]

Alan Sohn (Author), Cathy Grayson (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 4, 2006

Asperger's Syndrome is a form of autism--but with the right guidance, these children can go on to live happy, fulfilling lives.

In Parenting Your Asperger Child, Dr. Alan Sohn's and Cathy Grayson's groundbreaking Cognitive Social Integration Therapy (CSIT) offers practical solutions that help parents prepare their children for a fulfilling life of social interaction outside the confines of their syndrome, addressing such topics as:

- The six characteristics of Asperger's Syndrome
- How to identify a child's type of Asperger's--and the best approaches for dealing with it
- Understanding how an Asperger's child sees and interprets the world
- Replacing inappropriate coping techniques with productive skills
- How to survive and learn from a crisis
- How school programs can aid in teaching Asperger children - Making changes that last

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

In the crowded parenting category, there are two types of books: those that euphemistically recast time-honored childhood behaviors ("He's not being a brat, John. He's being spirited") and practical reference books, like this one, that offer bracing, hopeful advice about real developmental afflictions. To have written such a book on Asperger's syndrome—a class of autism with a swath of diagnostic markers that can range from attention deficit disorder to obsessive-compulsive disorder—is no small feat. Drawing from their respective experiences with Asperger children in clinical and school settings, the authors move succinctly through the traits and typologies of the syndrome, and into the everyday coping strategies that are the book's strength. Sohn and Grayson also deliver on their early promise to go beyond therapies that "focus on survival" (one chapter offers ways for parents to broaden their children's behavioral repertoire by introducing controlled, incremental crises). Abundant, true-to-life dialogues between Asperger children, their parents and peers model the strategies of school psychologist Grayson and special education teacher Sohn in action. A glossary of verbal cues (e.g., "in your mind" for thoughts children shouldn't voice aloud) offer elegant and unequivocal ways to redirect undesirable social behaviors. These practical solutions, along with language that is authoritative, reassuring and jargon-free, make this book an indispensable guide. (Feb. 1)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

About the Author

Alan Sohn, Ed.D., is a school psychologist and has been the consultant to the Bucks County Intermediate Unit Autistic Program for twenty years. He maintains a private practice in Newtown, Pennsylvania.

Cathy Grayson, M.A., is a special education teacher with the Bucks County Intermediate Unit in Pennsylvania, having taught all levels of the autistic spectrum for more than 20 years. She maintains a private consulting practice in Bala-Cynwyd, Pennsylvania. They are the founders of Sohn Grayson Autism Consultants.

Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 18 and up
  
• Mass Market Paperback: 288 pages
• Publisher: Perigee Trade (April 4, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0399530703
• ISBN-13: 978-0399530708
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6.1 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (22 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #64,350 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #53 in Books > Parenting & Relationships > Special Needs > Disabilities

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

40 of 40 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Great suggestions, but NOT an AS parenting overview, February 1, 2006

By 

Suzanne Amara (MA) - See all my reviews
(TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Parenting Your Asperger Child: Individualized Solutions for Teaching Your Child Practical Skills (Mass Market Paperback)

The title of this book would lead you to think it's about, well, parenting your AS child. However, it's much more focused than that---it's almost all about managing difficult behaviors that your child with AS shows. It's very good at what it does---the suggestions are very solid and very practical. However, they have the feel of ideas that would work much better in a classroom or a therapy session than at home. The book makes little to no mention of so many aspects of home life with Aspergers---siblings being one I find very significantly omitted, probably because you don't need to deal with siblings of a child at school or at therapy.

I liked the breakdown of different types of kids with AS (called things like Anxiety Boy). I haven't often seen it acknoledged how different kids with AS are from each other.


I think my main complaint about this book was its completely humorless tone. It seemed to see life with an AS child as an extremely serious and tough life---one where we must be vigilent every moment to make sure we handle the tough realities of their behavior correctly. That's not how I see my life, and I know a lot of other parents with kids with AS, and I can say that we mainly are a crowd that does enjoy life, even with our quirky kids!

I think this book is worth a read---it has great suggestions and is obviously well researched and written by professionals who care about kids. But it over-reaches if it aims to be a guide to parenting these complex and wonderful kids.

22 of 23 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Best of the Best!!!, May 25, 2005

By 

L. Bonner "Mission Mama" (North Carolina) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Parenting Your Asperger Child: Individualized Solutions for Teaching Your Child Practical Skills (Mass Market Paperback)

I have a son with Asperger's, not diagnosed until age thirteen, and I've probably bought every book out there on the subject. I have to say this book is far and away THE BEST and most useful one I've ever gotten. I just came across it a couple of weeks ago while browsing in a bookstore, and just flipping through it I could tell it was just what I'd been looking for. So many of the other books describe behaviors that seem to fit a majority of Aspies, but that didn't quite fit my son. I felt SO relieved to see the chapter on subtypes, to know that other children out there are like my son (no outburts, no impulsive behaviors or inappropriate communication, but very rigid, uninterested in friendships or independence at age 15, and with anxiety through the roof). To the authors: THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU!!!! I recommend this book to every Aspie parent I meet now, and tell them it's a 'must' for their libraries. Please write more!!!

18 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Can't do without this book ..., March 25, 2005

By 

M. Dean (Menlo Park, CA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Parenting Your Asperger Child: Individualized Solutions for Teaching Your Child Practical Skills (Mass Market Paperback)

This is the book I have been looking for. It seems to be written with the understanding that the parents of an Aspie may need to have material presented to them in the same way their child does (it is mainly genetic ... right?). The book offers helpful, practical and doable solutions to the everyday issues parents are handling with their Aspie child. All of us parents know when a writer/psychologist/doctor really "gets it" and believe me these two understand what it takes to help our children. This book has helped me calm MY anxiety about doing good by my son and to have a better picture of his future. You will not be able to put it down.