The community
What I have always been hoping to accomplish is the creation of community.Community is magic. Community is power. Community is resistance.Disability Visibility: First-Person Stories from the Twenty-First Century https://www.amazon.com/Disability-Visibility-First-Person-Stories-Twenty-First-ebook/dp/B082ZQBL98/ https://www.amazon.com/Disability-Visibility-Adapted-Young-Adults-ebook/dp/B08VFT4R9T/… More at Spectrum Gaming released “Key Principles when supporting autistic people” at Barriers to Education.
We believe in REAL coproduction, so have worked with our community to create ‘Our Key Principles When Supporting Autistic
@Spectrum0GamingAutistic ways of being are human neurological variants that can not be understood without the social model of disability.If you are wondering whether you are Autistic, spend time amongst Autistic people, online and offline. If… More Young People’.
We think they are really important, so have made them available for anyone to use/ read/ share.
We highly recommended this resource, including the rest
We urgently need a society that’s better at letting people get the rest they need.Fergus Murray WIP by Kristina Daniele I’m in pain. Mental. Physical. The result’s the same. Retreating… More of the site at Barriers to Education.
Key Principles
The following list of 6 principles was coproduced by the community at Spectrum Gaming. Visit their article, “Key Principles when supporting autistic people“, for more on the principles summarized below.
1. Autism Acceptance
In many spaces and places autism is seen as a negative thing. But Spectrum Gaming proves that autism is not a ‘disorder’ or a ‘burden’, it is simply a difference. Just like every other brain type, the autistic brain has its negatives and its positives. This space offers the chance for young people to realise that and learn to focus on their strengths, rather than be defined by their weaknesses.
We aim to offer a safe space for young people who may not have anywhere else. When young people join our community, they may be struggling because it can be very difficult to be autistic in a world that isn’t made for you.
Key Principles when supporting autistic people
2. Young people often need to recover from their negative experiences to be able to thrive
Young people need time, and the right support to recover. Especially since outside of Spectrum Gaming, they may still be exposed daily to trauma and stress. We need to be consistent in our support, especially when boundaries are tested to check we are still a safe, nonjudgmental, supportive space.
Key Principles when supporting autistic people
3. Young people do well if they can
We believe that all young people do well if they can. Everyone wants to thrive, do well, and no one wants to cause upset with others or break rules.
If someone is struggling – there is a reason why they are struggling. We can work together to identify reasons why and what may help.
Key Principles when supporting autistic people
4. Co-regulation
Young people need repeated experiences of co-regulation
Co-regulation is when we complete the stress cycle with the support of a safe enough person.Infants & small children do not have the biological capacity to complete the stress cycle… More from a regulated adult before they can begin to self-regulate (this is explained more below).
Key Principles when supporting autistic people
They may also not know how to regulate by themselves and we may be a key resource to help them create ways that work for them.
5. Self-Care
Self care
Key Principles when supporting autistic peopleThe activities that constitute care are crucial for human life. We defined care in this way: Care is “a species activity that includes everything that we do to maintain, continue,… More is vital – it isn’t possible to properly care for young people when you are overwhelmed yourself.
6. Neurodiversity affirming practice
We believe in the 5 As of neurodiversity
Key Principles when supporting autistic peopleNeurodiversity is the diversity of human minds, the infinite variation in neurocognitive functioning within our species.NEURODIVERSITY: SOME BASIC TERMS & DEFINITIONS Neurodiversity is a biological fact. It’s not a perspective, an approach, a… More affirming practice, from The Autistic Advocate. This is a strengths and rights-based approach to affirm a young person’s identity, rather than focusing on ‘fixing’ a young person because of their neurotype.
Visit “Key Principles when supporting autistic people” for more on the principles summarized above.
Autism and Trauma
Barriers to Education is a great resource for understanding autism and trauma. The key principles above help heal and avoid trauma.
When something happens which makes us feel unsafe, our brains respond by going into survival mode. Your brain sees something frightening, feels you are in life threatening danger and it must do whatever it can to get you to a sense of safety.
This is a natural process and it’s there to keep us alive. If you meet a wild animal, you need to get away fast, and so your brain will prioritise that. It won’t waste time looking around to check if that animal is really dangerous, it will just tell you to get out of there, now! There’s no time to stop and think.
The word ‘trauma’ is used to mean several different things. Sometimes it’s used to mean an actual event – like, we might describe a road traffic accident as ‘a trauma’. Other times it’s used to describe what happens in our brains during and after an event – more like a ‘traumatic
In expanding our definitions of trauma, we must make sure we see trauma as a structural issue, not just an individual one. Scholars now recognize what people from marginalized communities… More stress response’.
When a traumatic event happens, our brains go into survival mode – and then, once we are safe again, our brains go back to normalNormal was created, not discovered, by flawed, eccentric, self-interested, racist, ableist, homophobic, sexist humans. Normal is a statistical fiction, nothing less. Knowing this is the first step toward reclaiming your… More. We feel safe and calm again, even if the event was really scary.
However, sometimes things which happen can affect us for years afterwards. Even when we are safe from whatever made us feel in danger at first, our brains continue to behave as if we are under threat. That means that you might have the urge to run away, or to fight, or to freeze – when actually there is nothing dangerous. Your survival mode is being triggered and it can feel really frightening. This is a traumatic stress response. Sometimes that might lead to a diagnosis
Understanding Autism and TraumaSelf diagnosis is not just “valid” — it is liberatory. When we define our community ourselves and wrest our right to self-definition back from the systems that painted us as… More of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
Further Reading
Dr. Noami Fisher, a familiar name to followers of Stimpunks
Stimpunk combines “stimming” + “punk” to evoke open and proud stimming, resistance to neurotypicalization, and the DIY culture of punk, disabled, and neurodivergent communities. Instead of hiding our stims, we… More, is involved with Barriers to Education. Dr. Fisher’s book, “Changing Our Minds: How children can take control of their own learning“, is another highly recommended resource.
At one meeting I attended, one father told us how his eight-year-old son had been declared ineducable, and they had been told that he would have to spend his childhood at a psychiatric day hospital rather than at school. Another told of how his teenage son had hardly left his bedroom for two years, completely refusing to go to school, and had tried to kill himself. One mother told of how her daughter fought each morning not to go to school, scratching and biting them, for over a year.
These children are now members of the self-directed learning community, engaged in a wide range of activities. They are still the same people as before, with the same characteristics, but the pressure has been lifted and so they are able to flourish. Many of these children will have diagnoses. Home-educating parents tell similar stories – children whose behaviour at school was uncontrollable who start to behave differentlyOur friends and allies at Randimals have a saying, What makes us different, makes all the difference in the world.Randimals We agree. Randimals are made up of two different animals… More ethey are allowed to follow their interests and are treated with respect.
Changing Our Minds: How children can take control of their own learning
Something happens when children are in an environment in which they are valued and acceptedAcceptance means training mental health service providers to look at autism and other disabilities as a part of a person’s identity, rather than a problem that needs to be fixed. Acceptance… More for who they are. They see themselves as capable and as contributors to their community, and they develop and learn. That’s why the respectful and non-judgemental way that adults relate to children in self-directed environments is important. It doesn’t happen overnight. When you’ve spend years fighting a system, you can’t just forget all the strategies you learnt to survive.
These children are experiencing the shift from a system which sees their personalities as a problem, to one which genuinely accommodates difference. Because when children are really allowed to choose what they do, difference stops being such a problem.
Viewed through the lens of disorder, disruptive behaviour is a symptom. Viewed from a different perspective, it’s a sign that something isn’t right in the world around the child. It’s those children who are considered to be troublemakers, the ‘problem children’, who shine a light into corners which the rest of us might prefer to avoid.
Changing Our Minds: How children can take control of their own learning
Related reading
There are three types of reading: eye reading, ear reading, and finger reading.The Dyslexia Empowerment Plan: A Blueprint for Renewing Your Child’s Confidence and Love of Learning Most schools and… More from our website,
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