Programs

Autistry Studios offers a range of services to help students improve their real-world functioning and support parents through this time in their children’s lives. This work is done in the context of hands-on experiential workshops.

We currently offer 4 kinds of workshops:

The format for Autistry Studios Workshops is based on practices that we have found effective:

  1. Pairing of autism specialist and master craftsperson
  2. Small groups – 4-5 members
  3. Long sessions – each group meets for 3-4 hours
  4. Weekly meetings and 2-3 month project duration
  5. Social Time – a substantial break for a nutritious meal/snack
  6. Individual projects – each participant creates his/her own project

The workshops begin with an exploration of interests: what does the student really like to do, read about or dream of creating? Individuals on the Autistic Spectrum often have difficulty applying themselves to tasks in which they have no personal interest. In school they excel in some classes and fail at others. Their success rate is directly proportional to their interest.

Paradoxically, individuals on the Spectrum can have difficulty making progress on tasks which they find very interesting due to issues of self regulation – managing excitement, handling their own distractibility, etc. We encourage students to fully explore their interests and we assist them in learning new skills and coping strategies that will allow them to successfully pursue those interests. The process also provides them with greater insight into their own strengths and weaknesses as workers and students and allows them to take action to remediate some of their weaknesses.

Rather than mandating social interactions or creating artificial social situations, we facilitate naturally occurring interactions and conversations in the context of Autistry Studios activities. The longer workshop sessions and the meal break help create a friendly, comfortable environment where students feel more at ease expressing themselves. After a few weeks the students begin to initiate conversations on topics of interest to them and they discover that others share their interests. This discovery of commonality is the beginning of the creation of a social cohort. We encourage the students to stay in contact with each other outside of the workshops.