[Quick Tip] When Kids Come Off "Rude"
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Why might a child’s direct communication be perceived as rude and how does this relate to neurodiversity?
If you work with kids who come across as rude because they have a very direct communication style, is it neurodiversity affirming to work on using different kinds of language? Today we are going to be talking about that because I know it can be hard. We want to be able to honor how a child communicates, of course, but we also want to set them up for success and help them to, you know, develop friendships in the future and the way that they talk. talk to people can make a big difference. So how can we do this in a neurodiversity affirming way?
What's up everyone and welcome to Making the Shift for Autistic Kids.
We're an SLP couple from California with four boys.
And we're here every week to bring you neuroaffirming tips, tricks, and tools.
Are you ready
to make the shift? Let's do this!
Okay, so this was a question that we got in one of our Facebook groups. It said, I was wondering how you felt about goals for autistic students working on more positive social language.
Is it neuro‑diversity‑affirming to set language‑use goals for autistic students?
Some of the students on my caseload can be straightforward with peers and adults in the classroom, like saying things like, Leave me alone, don't talk to me, get away from me. Is it appropriate to work on goals that practice molding this language to be more appropriate slash positive? The language that these students are using are affecting their relationships with peers, although they are very social and invite peers to play to join in their play. I'm all for protesting, but is it not neurodiversity affirming to want to change this language? So this is such a great question. And the way that we can make this neurodiversity affirming is essentially that our goal is to educate a child. so that they get to make the decisions that feel right for them.
Right. So it would not be neurodiversity affirming to tell them you can't say it that way and you have to say it this way. So it wouldn't be neurodiversity for us to affirming for us to be like, don't say get away from anymore. You have to say Can I please have a minute by myself?
How can perspective‑taking conversations help kids understand the impact of their words?
Right. Our goal is not to force a child to do what we want them to do because it's what the neurotypical social norms are. However, we can have awesome conversations with kids about perspective taking and how a person might feel being responded to in one way versus another. Right. So how a person might feel if you said, get away from me, versus how they might feel if you said, Do you mind if I have a minute or something like that? Of course, age might play a factor in how much kids can understand in this, but working on perspective taking is totally fine. And can be done in a very neurodiversity affirming way because essentially we are saying Here's different ways that we can approach social situations.
And here's how different people might feel about this. And here's how that language might affect the outcome.
What strategies teach children to explain their communication style without forcing change?
So going through that with kids can be super, super helpful. Another thing that you can do is is you can talk about communication styles. So you can talk about what neurotypical communication styles might look like compared to, you know, autistic communication styles. You might talk about how autistic communication styles, people tend to be more direct and neurotypical communication styles tend to involve a lot more inferencing and I'm not necessarily saying straightforward what it is that they mean. And that can really help our kids too. And it could not only help them to understand other people's perspectives, but it can help them to advocate for themselves. Like It's fine if we want to help a kid advocate by
Letting them say something like I tend to be a really direct communicator.
How can therapists compare neurotypical and autistic communication styles to boost self‑advocacy?
Like I think a lot of us say that. Like it's like the It's like the people, you know, when they come up and they're like, I'm a hugger. It's like they're warning you in advance, like, I'm a hugger. Or um There's just people I feel like who come up to you and will just like give you that information up front. Like, and we do that a lot in therapy, you know, like, hey, here's how our sessions will go. And it's just giving someone a heads up of what's gonna happen.
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Chapters
6 chapters
1
Why might a child’s direct communication be perceived as rude and how does this relate to neurodiversity?
0:00–1:11
2
Is it neuro‑diversity‑affirming to set language‑use goals for autistic students?
1:11–2:18
3
How can perspective‑taking conversations help kids understand the impact of their words?
2:18–3:23
4
What strategies teach children to explain their communication style without forcing change?
3:23–4:17
5
How can therapists compare neurotypical and autistic communication styles to boost self‑advocacy?
4:17–4:56
6
What are the key takeaways for supporting kids in choosing language that feels comfortable for them?
4:56–6:14
Speakers
1 identifiedMore from The NeuroAffirm Podcast
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Ep. 124 Building Rapport Isn’t Enough...How Therapists Become Part of the Intervention
Ep. 123 Not Seeing Progress in Speech Therapy? Start Here.
Ep. 122 Screen Time Considerations for Autistic Kids
Ep. 121 The Biggest Sensory Mistakes SLPs Make
Ep. 120 Why Anxiety is So Common in Autism (And What Actually Helps)