Myth: Autistic people don't feel emotions

Transcript

 Autistic people don't feel emotions. That's false. They do, but emotions don't always look the same for everyone. And that goes for neurodivergent people and neurotypical people. Um, well, one student might show through tears or laughter, another might express through movement or even silence. A student who can be experiencing, um, anxiety, they might seem disengaged, whereas a student who's ignoring directions might actually just be overwhelmed.

And that's why it's so important to get to know students individually so you can understand the unique ways that they express and communicate their emotions. Um, here are a few ways that you can check in with your students and see how they're really feeling. One way is to just ask them and give them options.

Giving them options makes it easier for them to be able to communicate it. So you can say, are you feeling sad, happy, nervous, excited, et cetera. The list goes on. Um, another way is to use visuals or feelings charts to help them communicate it. They might not be able to, um, verbally express it, but they can point and say, you know, that, that's how I'm feeling.

We actually have, uh, an emotions poster on socialcipher.com where it's like different facial expressions and then different emotions, and it's really good to just put on the wall and have your students point at how they're feeling that day. Another way is to, um, and just encourage them to write or draw or even ask for like a simple thumbs up or thumbs down so it's not, you know, too much labor on their part to express how it is that they're feeling, but you still can get that information.

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