One of the most important lessons we can teach our children is self-advocacy. Frequently, our first instinct is to try to clear paths for them – which can certainly be an important task. However, we are only doing half our job if we don’t also teach our children to clear the paths themselves, since we will not always be there to do it for them.

If we wait until they’re ready to leave home, our children will face the world without having practice in the advocacy skills they’ll need in order to be successful in navigating the outside world. This is especially problematic for children with special needs that make it difficult for them to learn purely by example. For this reason, it is important that we get our children involved in self-advocacy from an early age, constantly explaining the process and gradually increasing their involvement as they master each step.

Editor Stephen M. Shore has compiled a valuable guide to this process, Ask and Tell: Self-Advocacy and Disclosure for People on the Autism Spectrum (Autism Asperger Publishing Company, 2004). The entire book is written by people with autism, and it helps readers gain a full understanding of the challenges these individuals face. The authors of the essays that comprise this book address advocacy for children and adults at school, work, personal life, and even in community organizing. The book is also helpful for parents of children with other special needs, including AD/HD and learning disabilities.

Most parents will find two chapters to be the most immediately useful sections of the book: “Help Me Help Myself: Teaching and Learning,” by Kassiane Sibley; and “Using the IEP to Build Skills in Self-Advocacy and Disclosure,” by Stephen M. Shore. It is worth buying this book just for these chapters.

In “Help Me Help Myself,” Sibley starts out by saying:

Self-advocacy is a topic I find extremely important because it is so rarely thought about and discussed. I have had to learn advocacy skills the hard way, and I do not want that for my younger peers. I find myself frustrated by parents and professionals who prefer to strive for “indistinguishable from peers” rather than self-sufficiency. Independence does not and should not have to equal typicality, but in so many people’s eyes the two are synonymous. I firmly believe that everyone on the autistic spectrum can and should learn advocacy skills.

Sibley discusses a six-stage plan for learning or teaching self-advocacy skills, starting with planning and modeling and eventually progressing to independent self-advocacy. She states, “The first stage demonstrates, with the autistic person’s involvement, how to plan for successful self-advocacy. After being involved in the planning of this stage, the person on the autism spectrum observes the partner in the act of advocating ...”

Sibley provides sample letters and examples of how she advocates for herself in daily life. She also discusses the importance of learning to tell the difference between times when it is reasonable to ask for a situation to be adapted for her versus times when she has to find ways to cope. Sibley’s training stages should prove useful in working with people with AD/HD and other special needs, as well as with people on the autism spectrum.

Shore’s chapter, “Using the IEP to Build Skills in Self-Advocacy and Disclosure,” discusses how IEP meetings can be used as a venue for learning self-advocacy. He shows ways to involve younger children and, eventually over the years, increase their involvement to the point where they are full participants in the meeting. As Shore explains, this is a crucial skill for students to learn before leaving high school, since they will have to be prepared to request needed accommodations and services at college or on the job. By being involved in the IEP process, students learn more about their own needs as well as gain practice navigating the official system for getting their needs met.

Every parent of a child with autism or other special needs and every professional working with this population should have a copy of this book.

Meredith Warshaw, M.S.S., M.A., is a special needs educational advisor, writer, lecturer, and contributing editor for 2e: Twice-Exceptional Newsletter. She may be reached for comment and response to this column at MW@2eNewsletter.com.