http://cnettv.cnet.com/av/video/cbsnews/atlantis2/cbsnews_player_embed.swf

Quite a number of my friends have sent me a link to Sunday's 60 Minutes special, "Apps for Autism." Leslie Stahl explains that iPads help severely affected communicate. They've had Assistive Communication Devices for a while, but the iPad is cheaper and, maybe, more fun. 

I can't think of a particular app on the iPad that would work on Ian's weaknesses. There aren't apps that make a kid with sensory issues put on long pants. (He's in shorts today.) But I think that he definitely responds well to visual information, and his teacher could be supplementing her lessons with technology a lot more. He's learning geometry in school right  - right angles, perpendicular, and all that. Geometry lessons could be entirely done on the dusty smart board in the front of the classroom. Visual information definitely helps supplement his understanding of material, since he still has weird and huge gaps in his vocabulary.

Computer programs also help him to tap into his strengths in a way that school can't. He's building amazing structures in a program called Minecraft.

It also piques his interest in topics that translate into off-screen action. He loves a computer website called Poptropica. Because of that website, we're now reading two chapters of Magic Tree House books every night.