Structured TEACCHing

No I haven’t spelt it wrong, I wanted to share a little bit about the Intensive 3-Day TEACCH Training Course I attended earlier this year. Below i’ve pointed out the basic principles of TEACCH Training and highlighted the definition “The Culture of Autism”. You can get more in-depth information from TEACCH. I haven’t gone into great detail on the three days spent in a room with Professor Gary Mesibov (former Director of Div. TEACCH) but instead how it has inspired me to stick to there principle in my classroom. It’s safe to say that Mesibov knows his stuff and definitely fulfilled his role as the more knowledgeable other.

The Principles of Structured TEACCHing:

• Understand the culture of autism (see below)
• Developing an individual person and family centred plan for each client or student
• Structuring the physical environment
• Using visual support to make the sequence of daily activities predictable and understandable
• using visual supports to make individual tasks understandable

“The Culture of Autism” (As defined by TEACCH)

• Relative strength in and preference for processing visual information
• Frequent attention to detail
• Difficulty combining ideas
• Difficulty with organising ideas, materials and activities
• Difficulties with attention
• Difficulties with concepts of time
• Communication Problems
• Tendency to become attached to routines
• Very strong interests and impulses in engaging in favoured activities
• Marked sensory preferences and dislikes

Nothing too unfamiliar to any good teaching practice but it’s the research that supports the TEACCH approach that gives it solid ground for practice. Mesibov provides evidence of TEACCH supporting successful transition to adulthood, most inspiring were the videos of adults and young people with autism reaching their high expectations and aspirations. I’ll certainly be checking that my teaching practice includes the fundamental principles of TEACCH. Structure doesn’t mean cutting down on creative and imaginative lessons, it just results in a bit more work to ensure they fit to the structured teaching principles.

A short video by Camden Council with a pupil explaining The Teach Approach: