Expert: James Michael Roan - 10/6/2006

Question
We have a son who is about 3 and a half years old. We are from chennai India, and moved into Switzerland about 6 months back. Our son has been going to a play school in India.  We continued in another play group school here
in Swiss. A month back, the teachers reported an unusually aggressive behaviour from  our son.  He has been hitting his classmates without
any provocation.  He screams and shouts for no reason and gets very disruptive to the whole class. At home he is perfectly normal, speaks well, keeps back his toys in place and throws tantrums only when he is hungry or feeling sleepy or sick (cold/ cough/ fever).  He comes home and tells us the names of his friends he has hit that day and that the teachers gave
him a 'TIME OUT'.  teachers tell us
that when he is alone with them, he is very composed and positively interactive. When put back into the group he is aggressive again.
Teachers and we as parents are quite baffled with this. We took him to a doctor
who said it is too early to check symptoms of ADHD or others.  Dr. found him to be a bit hyper.  my son is not too obsessive with any / one toy. he loves physical activity and can play in park sliding down big slides independently and confidently. He gets quite worked up with automobile noises (which is quite disturbing in the place we live). Often he does not
respond when he is called, but can join our talk even when we speak in low tone (on other topics). The school here is very supportive. Can you suggest us what is the best course of action on this.

Answer
Hi R. Prasad;

The behaviors you described could fit primarily with language and/or sensory problems. In autism we are primarily looking at social delays or even social aversion in some cases. Children with high functioning autism (HFA)can appear like this, but I really need more information:

1. Does he play with his toys properly or does he mostly line them up or spin the wheels of the cars?

2. Does he imitate your actions and those of others? Does pretend play?

3. How is his eye contact with you and others?

4. Does he point to things that interest him in an attempt to share them with you or does he exclusively point to things he wants you to get for him?

5. Does he play interactively with others or is it solitary play?

I recommend you first download the M-CHAT from here:
http://www.firstsigns.org/downloads/m-chat.PDF

Then get the scoring guide here:
http://www.firstsigns.org/downloads/m-chat_scoring.PDF

If there is any risk noted or if you have any questions, contact me again to discuss the results.

Kind Regards,
James