Good evening class I am going to be discussing Autism this evening.
According to the Center for disease control prevention one out of every one hundred child born is a child with autism. There are 1.5 million Americans who live with autism spectrum disease. And the disorder is growing 10 – 17% every year.
Autism is a physical condition linked to abnormal chemistry in the brain this effects the brains normal development of social and communication skills. Autism is a spectrum disorder which means that it is characterized as an umbrella ranging from very severe to mild. And it appears in the first 3 years of life.
I am a teacher assistant and have been working extensively with kids with autism for the past 21/2 years. The program that I teach is a social skills language development program for children ages 3 -5 years of age. The childrens disabilitiesrange from severe to very mild. We work on pretend play, social interactions and expressive language. We have seen incredible progress even though there is no known cure for autism. (Talk about alex’s progress)
No one knows the exact cause of autism. But there are a combination of factorsscientists believe that could contribute to autism such as: Genetics and Vaccination
Genetically in families where one sibling has autism typically the other siblings will also have autism. This is shown especially true in identical twins when one twin has autism because the twins are genetically linked itis typical the other will have autism as well. Now in the case in which a set of twins are fraternal not identical in that case if one twin has autism it is most likely the other twin will not have autism because these set of twins have different genetics.
The other possible cause is vaccinations. Researchers believe that the MMR vaccine that is usually given to a toddler at the age of 18mo has such high levels of mercury that may cause autism.
I personally believe that the combination of both genetics and the...