Early Days of RPM

Sharolyn wrote:  I want to hear about the early days of RPM and what made it click for you.

To Sharolyn,

Thank you for your question. My early days of RPM were very difficult. RPM is a great learning method but it was really hard to start. I started when I was 9. For so many years I was assumed to have an intellect of a toddler. I was not challenged to engage my mind. Instead I had my senses to entertain me all day. At school I learned nothing I did not already know. So I taught myself to read the signs on the wall. I stimmed my life at home by tapping my hand repeatedly on everything. It helped me feel alive and not just a passive object taking up space. I could escape in my mind to other places where I would have a voice. 

I remember my first time doing RPM with Soma as being the most significant moment in my life. Soma was the first person to believe in me. Her ability to see my intelligence despite my outer appearance allowed me to follow her teaching and respond as my mind wanted. I felt so much joy from being liberated from peoples’ assumptions I was not smart. 

When I came home I was frustrated I could not respond to Mom like I did with Soma. Mom did not know how to prompt me to help me keep my mind and body engaged. I could think of what she was saying but could not get my body to move as my mind directed. I became frustrated and tried to escape the lessons. My mom got upset many times and yelled at me. That made me feel so stressed. But mom persisted. Dad made me my own little workspace with a small table. It was easier for me to concentrate and not escape. Eventually I got better at sitting through lessons.

RPM taught me how to leave my own sensory world to actively participate with others for a while. I first had to learn how to listen actively to respond to questions of me. Expectations that I would meet had to be meaningful. I was tired of being asked the same questions over and over again. Questions like how many, what color, and what is it. These were the questions I got all day long at school. I listened better when I heard something new and interesting. Nothing could be better than learning about God. Mom headed toward the right direction when she started teaching me about God. 

After I got better listening I had to learn to bring my body under better control to point to what I wanted to answer. RPM helped me by getting me to think more and plan my movements more carefully. At first it was hard. I had to engage my mind and body together to learn and show I was learning by picking the right choices and trying to spell. Getting a good lesson helped me listen better to Mom. Then I would learn to focus on getting my hand to choose the right choice. At first my hand would move without much control. It would sometimes prefer to choose one side. I am easily drawn to the word I heard last. My hand would pick the last choice. Things started to click when my mom started to teach more interesting lessons instead of quizzing me on basic concepts. I made progress by a lot of active engagement of my mind. This allowed me to leave my sensory world. Learning to think through autistic impulses is hard work. Autistic impulses envelope me in a purely sensory realm where I am alone in my world. I need high amounts of prompting to keep me engaged with you. I want to be a part of what is going on but I am passive because I am not able to get out of my sensory world without your help directing me to leave so that I can interact with others. I am learning to better join the world today. I am practicing by going to school with typical classmates and going out in the world more. I stay more peaceful than I used to. I think RPM has a lot to do with it. RPM is a life changer. It is worth the struggles in the beginning. It gets easier. 

Love, 

Philip 

 Soma and me at first RPM Camp Oct. 2012

My old workspace

Copyright 2017 Philip Reyes.  All rights reserved.

About RPM

By Lisa

It has been an exciting week having Philip's essay published in The Buffalo News and subsequently picked up by The Mighty and Yahoo News.  We have received so much love and positive feedback, a few skeptical comments (and that's ok), and lots of questions.  Today, I'd like to give you my overview of what RPM is.

The essays Philip has written in this blog were typed letter by letter on a keyboard and saved onto a tablet computer.  Earlier essays were spelled on a letterboard and transcribed by me, his mom, into a notebook.  Philip was unable to express his thoughts until our family learned Rapid Prompting Method (RPM) from Soma Mukhopadhyay.  Prior to RPM, Philip had many therapies and interventions standard to autism:  Applied Behavioral Analysis (ABA), speech therapy, occupational therapy, alternative medicine, Relationship Development Intervention, and special education.  Although he gained something from each thing he tried, it wasn’t until we used RPM that Philip could express what he was really thinking and feeling in ways most others could understand.  It finally bridged the communication gap between Philip and us. 

RPM was developed by Soma Mukhopadhyay, (affectionately called “Soma” by people who have come to know her) to teach her own autistic son Tito in India.  In India there were not the many therapy options I have had in the United States. According to Soma, when she asked the doctor what she should do for her son after receiving the autism diagnosis, the doctor replied, “Keep him busy.”  So Soma took him at his word and made the most of her time figuring out her son and coming up with a way to teach and reach her son.  After spending some time with Soma through organizing workshops in my area and then training with her in Austin, I have come to the conclusion that she is one of the smartest people I have ever known.  Her observations about how Tito interacted with his environment through the different senses, as well as her understanding of his movement differences, helped her come up with the practice of what is now known as RPM.  When Tito was 12, he wrote his first book.  From then on, mother and son were to be recognized and sought out for understanding autism and how to harness the hidden potential from autistic people who could not communicate in a conventional manner.

So what is RPM?   RPM is a teaching method that addresses the difficulties in sensory processing and executive functioning that often accompany autism and other disabilities.  An RPM session consists of an age appropriate lesson such as a lesson in science or social studies that a typical developing child might take at school.  The lesson is given in a way that stimulates the senses to focus on what is being taught.  Interesting lessons are told in engaging ways, like a story, rather than in a monotonous droning way.  Key words or illustrations are written on paper in front of the student to stimulate visual learning.  The student is asked to respond in a back and forth manner to demonstrate understanding of the material.  The student responds first by making choices between two written answers.  Eventually the student learns to spell on a letter stencil, flat letterboard, or keyboard.  Prompting is often necessary to keep the student focused, initiate movement toward the letterboard, and encourage the completion of the task.  Contrary to what might be thought, physical prompts are not used to help lead a child to an answer.  You won’t see hand-over-hand contact in RPM.  The teacher treats the student respectfully by believing he is capable of learning at an age appropriate level and using regular conversation that is not reduced to commands and praise for compliance.  The combination of knowledge through a broad education, reasoning skills from interactive learning, and respectful treatment through presuming intelligence and competence in the learner, provides a springboard to meaningful communication of original thoughts and feelings. 

What is RPM not?  RPM is not a cure for autism.  Its goal is not to make a person lose his autistic qualities.  Rather, the goal is to work in cooperation with the autistic neurology with its stims, alternate sensory patterns, and movement differences to accommodate regular learning and communication.  Ironically, the results of RPM have helped Philip alleviate the most distressing aspects of his autism.  Over the 3 years of doing RPM, Philip’s self-injury diminished to where he has not banged his head in over a year.  Philip finally completed toilet training.  The boy who could not tolerate going to loud places like an auditorium or trying new activities is now fully immersed in going to concerts, sports events, and theater, and getting involved in biking, ice skating, and soccer.  He is also able to be included in mainstream learning and activities.  RPM is not an easy miracle.  Because the child cannot help himself in the beginning, success is really dependent on the child’s primary caregiver, often a parent, being committed to spending time learning how to implement RPM, making good lessons, and practicing regularly with the child.  Gains come only with consistency and hard work.

We will be forever grateful to Soma and Tito for sharing RPM with the world.  We would not be where we are today without them.

To find out more about RPM, visit HALO's website.  You can also view videos showing Philip's progress so far using RPM.

Meeting Soma for the first time- October 2012

 

         

Classmate Question on Learning to Communicate

A Classmate writes:

Hi Philip,

I just wanted to ask how you are taught or how you learn to speak sign language.  It seems hard to learn so I want to know how you learn it.  Also, how long did it take to learn what you know now?

Philip's response:

I do not know sign. I type my answers. My method of communication is Rapid Prompting Method. I learned when I was nine. I started by going to Austin, Texas to learn from Soma how to learn about lessons for kids my age. I was given lessons in math, science, history, and literature for the first time. My parents learned to teach me. I talked by pointing to letters on a letterboard to spell words. Later I learned to type. I still need an aide to help me stay focused and on task. This is because autism makes me captive to impulses. An aide helps me overcome my impulses so I can follow where my mind really wants to go. A lot of practice has gotten me far. I still have a long way to go.  People make my life better by politely helping me be peacefully included. I am always treated well at Heim. 

Thoughts On Autism

By Rohit Dixit

I have noticed these days having autism is no big thing. Today everybody knows about it. But at the same time I am not surprised there are some people who are ignorant to the fact that they think they are perfect. But I think nobody is perfect in this world. These kind of people are selfish. They think they can do anything without anybody's  help. But they are wrong. They are the ones who need most of the help to behave in a society where you encounter all kinds of people.

I wonder how the rest of the world is treating autism! I just read from an Indian news paper, that children are not getting the services they require because inadequate training and awareness. The world needs to know how important the awareness is.

One last note, how lucky we all are to be the students of Soma, who taught us this method to be a part of human race and everyone can hear our voice. Above all we should be grateful to our parents for deeply committing to us.

Rohit is 18 years old with Autism. He was diagnosed at age 3 and began to see Soma to learn Rapid Prompting Method (RPM) when he was 6. He graduated high school last summer. He wants to be a journalist.  Rohit has his own blog called Sinking Into Popular Thoughts.