Behavioral

• Over or under reaction to sight, sound, smell, taste, pain or touch (including being held)
• Difficulty using items or toys to represent real objects
• Repetitive actions or body movements
• Difficulty joining other people
• Unusual postures, walking or movement patterns
• No fear of real dangers
• Intense anxiety or unusual lack of anxiety
• Sudden, unexplained, extreme distress or fear
• Problems coping with change; dependency on parts of routines
• Unusual or inappropriate habits or interests
• Focus on moving or spinning objects
• Laughing, giggling or screaming at unusual times
• Difficulty imitating gross or fine motor movements
• Intense or unusual activity levels
• Unusual sleep patterns

Communication

• Inability to point to express need or interest
• Indicating needs with gestures (sometimes unusual) instead of words
• Difficulty imitating sounds and words
• Loss of or delay in developing spoken language
• Difficulty using speech in a meaningful way
• Rarely initiates communication
• Repeating words or phrases heard previously
• Confusing gender (he, she) and pronouns (I, me, you) in speech
• Unusual pitch and rhythm in speech
• Unusual or lack of eye contact
• Unusual or lack of facial expression
• Difficulty interacting with other people (responding back and forth, turn-taking), making friends, and understanding others
• Difficulty controlling emotion and excitement

Learning

• Difficulty paying attention
• Difficulty shifting attention (stuck on an idea or action)
• Difficulty sharing attention with others
• Difficulty understanding abstract ideas
• Difficulty grasping time and order of events
• Thoughts and actions may appear illogical
• Strong memory and sense of direction
• May not benefit from typical teaching methods

   

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