Beverly Vicker, M. S.: Sharing Information About Your Child with Autism Spectrum Disorder: What do Respite or Alternative Caregivers Need to Know?

Abstract

Sharing Information About your Child with Autism Spectrum Disorder is an easy to read primer that details suggestions on how a parent should instruct a caregiver to supervise their child with autism. It is very well organized and detailed, but not particularly insightful. The introduction for the book comments, ‘‘An attempt has been made to keep the information on these pages short, easy-to-read and within the reading level of the typical respite worker (high school reading level)’’ (p. 4). The book is successful at that task, but as a consequence may have limited audience appeal. The brilliance of this book is its every day application and the easy to use worksheets. In this day of suits on copy write infringement, it is rare to find a book that so clearly encourages the reader to make copies of its pages. In fact, to assist in this endeavor, a CD is attached to the back of the book. The first section of the book is basically a series of lists of questions on topics designed to prod a parent as to what information they should share about their child. At times, it is repetitive, but the inventory of questions is organized in such a fashion that you can easily skip nonrelevant topics such as bathing, as many part time caregivers never bath their charge leaving that as a parental responsibility. The second section of the book is a series of simple essays on topics of high interest to caregivers. These essays are a type of Social Story for caregivers. ‘‘Why doesn’t the child look at me?’’ or ‘‘Why does this child talk on and on and on?’’ are relevant and useful tools to share with anyone who interacts with a child or adult with autism. The third section, detailing the case history of two families, is tedious to read, but may be useful as a point of reference. The fourth and final section of the book has nearly 30 pages of worksheets. Many of the pages are nearly blank with only a modest heading and it makes you wonder if they should have just saved the trees. The accompanying CD has all of the worksheets in two different formats, one as the author intended, and a second version that allows you to make individual edits, which is a very creative idea.