Customer Reviews

Power Cards: Using Special Interests to Motivate Children and Youth with Asperger Syndrome and Autism

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The Power Card Strategy has become one of the most effective strategies we use in our school. It is intrinsically motivating to students because it incorporates a student's special interest or favorite character into a story that helps them understand appropriate behaviors. The Power Card story is fun to develop because the student's favorite TV personality, cartoon character or real life hero explains the importance of using the appropriate behavior and explains how to display this behavior by following the listed steps. This resource has many examples of the Power Card Strategy and walks you through writing your own Power Card story and Power Card. It is an excellent resource for teachers, parents and other professionals who are involved in shaping children's behaviors.

I am a special eduacation teacher in Illinois and work with children with autism spectrum disorder. I mainly work with children with high functioning autism and Asperger Syndrome. I have used the Power Card book several times and my district is adapting the strategy as one that really works with this population. My students can relate to their "obsessions" while learning rules- it's perfect! I have seen a significant increase in several target (preferred) behaviors with many students with autism and AS after the Power Card stratedy was implemented. I am big fan of this book. It's easy for anyone to use and I highly recommend it to parents and professionals.

This book is wonderful and helps me so much with my Asperger's son. I was even able to share it with my son's special education teacher. She thought it was wonderful. It's a great resource for Asperger's children who have a special interest. It's a way to communicate with them. Well worth your money. I'm buying another copy to donate to my son's school.

This book is a valuable resourcefor parents and special educators. It offers readers examples of incorporating a child's special interest into a motivational tool to help shape behaviors. The examples are easy to follow and easily translated into real life situations. The reader can certainly take the information in this book and apply it to their own children/students with special needs.

Autism and its related condition, Asperger's Syndrome are neurobiolgical conditions that affect sensory processing and communication. The range is as great as there are people on the a/A spectrum and there are often overlapping behaviors.

People with Asperger's, or the "milder" form of autism often have special interests. These interests are often referred to as "obsessions" by the neurotypical population. The term "special interests" is much kinder and much more apt. In most cases, people who live or work with people who have special interests understandably try to limit the amount of time the person spends on the special interests. This is a rather stop-gap approach because it merely meets the needs of the neurotypical population and denies the person on the autism spectrum that much needed pleasure and release.

I love the way this book encourages professionals and other interested persons to use special interests to engage people on the spectrum. This is a very effective teaching method and will pay dividends.

I have read and re-read the Power Cards book with great satisfaction. This new approach to working with some of our special kids is wonderful and I have found that these concepts really work. They are well thought out and easy to do. I hope that everyone will give this concept a try, especially when it seems nothing else seems to work.

Power Cards is a great tool in helping some autistic children modify and/or change their inappropriate behavior. It might not be the right tool for all autistic children, but for some it can really open up doors to social appropriateness and development. The examples are great and the clinical results listed in the book give a great deal of credibility to this strategy.

This book is for higher functioning individuals on the spectrum. It is for kids with very high coginitive abilities and comunication skills. The idea behind this book is to use the sometimes rigid interests of kids on the spectrum and teach them socially appropriate skills.

As a mother of two daughters with autism, I found this book to be very helpful. My daughters like many children with autism, have very strong areas of interest. We use this strategy at home and at school and have found that when they aren't motivated by their teachers or peers that using one of their interests holds their attention and encourages them to continue and get their work done. This book is better suited for higher functioning children

After reading the positive revievs of this book I decided to buy it, and I was sorely disappointed. The author seems to have had some level of success with some ASD children by using potential special interests to modify behaviour, by telling that "a Spice Girl" would never do that..

The idea is good and might help sometime, but I found th book extremely narcicistic and belitteling.

It should have been a 3 page note instead of a book, and it would have been better for it!