I remember when they first brought Harrison* into my class. He made eye-contact for a fraction of a second, then seemed to busily scan the room. “We think he’s autistic, or he might have ADHD,” I was told. “Anyway, he’s just…difficult.” It was explained to me that no one was quite sure how to handle him, but maybe since I had an autistic child of my own, I might have some ideas.
The rest of my class gave off heavy sighs. They knew Harrison from previous incidents in Sunday School, before I had become their teacher. Harrison was not easy to ignore. They had an idea of what we were in for. Prior to this moment, we had become a tight-knit group with a predictable lesson routine. We had regular class parties in my home and had fallen into a comfortable friendly groove. The kids acted a bit like we had an alien invader. Harrison looked smaller and more fragile than the other children in my class. He appeared to be eight or so, but I couldn’t be sure. I hadn’t been told his age.
I continued my lesson, and Harrison immediately put his head through the opening in the back of his chair and raised his bottom high in the air. The class giggled. He then put his hands on the carpet and rubbed them vigorously, then slowly moved up the metal legs of the chair. “Harrison, why don’t you turn around in your seat so you can listen?” I asked. He ignored me.
He was never able to sit up in his chair, and eventually started to wander around the room, his hands brushing against the walls. He hummed to himself, with a faraway gaze on his face. His behavior was distracting but not totally disruptive, so I initially ignored it. But when the children moved from individual classes into their large group activity, joined by many other classes, Harrison went wild. He opened several cabinets and slammed them shut repeatedly, before I could catch him. He sprawled out on the floor and rolled his body back and forth. He climbed over chairs and raced up to the front of the room, grabbing anything in his path. When I tried to restrain him on my lap he vigorously thrashed, tightening and loosening his body to free himself.
Suddenly something dawned on me. This child is craving sensory input, I realized. I reviewed his behaviors in my head: He had rubbed the carpet, the walls, banged cabinets, hummed, and lay himself on the ground, rolling back and forth. These were surely his desperate attempts to have sensory experiences. It suddenly became obvious to me that he craved touch and sound, at least. He was under-sensitive to them.
As the children sang and received instruction, Harrison continued to thrash around on my lap, refusing any attempt to be verbally or physically controlled. But soon I noticed that in the row in front of me, a little girl was discreetly holding a squishy ball with plastic nubs on it. The ball had a sticky, rubbery texture with a long rubber piece for spinning it and jiggling it like a yo-yo. It was noiseless. I had seen these toys for a couple of bucks at the grocery store. They have an irresistible texture and feel. “Can I borrow that for a few minutes?” I asked the girl. She nodded and handed me the toy.
I gave it to Harrison, and he instantly stopped thrashing. He began vigorously squeezing and manipulating the ball, with a faint smile on his face. “If you sit quietly beside me, you can play with it,” I said. Harrison sat quietly and handled the toy. He was happily receiving sensory input. He was quiet and compliant. And then, something else happened. The children began to sing, and Harrison, still squishing the toy, began singing the words, right on key. I hadn’t even known he could do that. The sensory input calmed him.
Church ended, and Harrison and the children found their parents. I returned the toy to its owner, and decided this would be an interesting undertaking. Tomorrow I would go to the dollar store and find every unusual, cheap sensory object I could get. Each week, I will bring a new one, or several, to class…things that squish, rub, feel smooth, feel scratchy, etc. Harrison will get to handle the object if he sits quietly, and if not, I’ll remove it. I’ll also inject more physical activity into my lessons. An experiment is underway.
I will report what happens after my next class. There’s an intelligent, charming spark in Harrison that I observed for myself. I think he’s reachable. I believe his overwhelming need for sensory input is clouding his potential. Who am I, but an ordinary mom and Sunday School teacher… what can I really do? But surely every human being who interacts with this special boy can in some small way make a difference. I’m going to try my hand.
*Not his real name.
Kristyn Crow is the author of this blog. Visit her website by clicking here. Some links on this blog may have been generated by outside sources are not necessarily endorsed by Kristyn Crow.
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