Awareness of Students with Diverse Learning Needs,
What the Teacher Needs to Know, Volume 1

Recognizing the Child with
Asperger's Disorder

Individuals may display the following observable characteristics.
A diagnosis by appropriately qualified medical personnel is needed to verify the condition. Qualified personnel include the developmental/
assessment team at Sunny Hill Hospital for Children, B.C. Children's Hospital or Queen Alexandra Hospital or a pediatrician, psychiatrist or a registered psychologist.

• Inability to relate to people considered normal.
• Peculiarities of eye gaze and naive, abnormal behaviour.

• Speech is pedantic and perseverative, e.g., words and phrases are repeated over and over.
• Unusual language characteristics:
  • exaggerated length of utterances,
  • embedded sentences or locked in wording,
  • unusual prosody or minimal variation in stress, pitch or rhythm,
  • overly precise,
  • written text consists of continuous, unduly prolonged, declarations or statements,
  • impervious to the listener's needs, and
  • clumsy communication and interpersonal readiness.
• Poor non-verbal communication, e.g., reduced facial expression, monotonous intonation and limited and inappropriate gestures.
• Poor comprehension of other persons' verbal and non-verbal expression.
• Strong attachments to certain possessions, repetitive activities and distress at change of whereabouts.
• Clumsiness and poor coordination.
• Special interests and skills, usually dependent on excellent rote memory (e.g., marked eccentricity).
• Normal or high I.Q.
• Demonstrates several strengths, e.g., stamina, enjoys routines, good long term memory, accuracy.