I have had a request from a friend to talk about how to interact with Autistic children. From my personal experience the best thing first would be to ask the parent or caregiver how severe the child is (of course if you know that the child is autistic or disabled). That way you will get a better idea about how to talk or interact with the child, and in most cases you will be surprised how much the mom will love talking to you about it. If you don't have an opportunity to ask a parent or caregiver. In my experience, I would suggest not trying to hug or touch them. Most autistic kids have sensory issues and they usually don't like to be touched. Some autistic kids won't understand most things you say to them. You usually can't talk to them like you would talk to a typical kid. Although some will understand what you are asking or saying to them, again that is when the spectrum part comes in. I think most people can pick up on if a child is not responding to them. For example, if you walked up to Kara and asked her, how is your day, she will not respond and sometimes not even acknowledge you are there. It is tricky to interact with them, but in the end I would say whatever you do don't be afraid of them, if you don't know what to do just talk or interact with them how you normally would and your good senses will kick in on how to interact with them.
There is a BIG spectrum and lots of kids fall from serve, and mild. For Kara she is severe. She does not talk, but she does know sign language. Some kids communicate through a system called PECS. Which stands for Picture Exchange Communication System. (read more at this link)
I think this paragraph is very important. I have underlined an important part of this definition. The however caught my eye. Which means it is not a cure, it is not proven that it will help kids with autism communicate, but it doesn't hurt to try.
Effectiveness
There is preliminary evidence that PECS is easily learned by most students, with its primary benefit being a means for communication by children and adults who have little or no speech due to autism or other developmental disabilities. However, there is very limited data on the effectiveness of PECS on both challenging and social-communicative behaviors, and inconsistent and unclear data on whether PECS affects speech development.
I noticed that PECS was not working for Kara after two months. You have to stay in tuned with your child and what they are and are not responding too. So many times we rely on the therapist, or the people that work with our children to have all the answers and to be able to tell us, but the truth is they don't. I realized, I am my child's best advocate.
A lot of people use this way to communicate with Autistic kids. We tried this communication when Kara was two years old. She did not seem to understand the pictures. We still tried it with her for a year, but in the mean time we mainly did sign language with her. Kara responded better to sign language. She is a great signer. She knows about forty signs, but it also took her four years to teach her those forty signs.
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