Ten Second Delay
Here's a subject that I'm really hoping will be read by others, so that you will comment and hopefully get a real forum going.
Will has always had this "ten second delay" thing. It's improved over the years, but when he was little, you could ask him a question, and, after a "ten second delay," he would finally answer. It's as if he has a delay in what he hears, rather than a delay in his answer to your question. Of course this affects his social life. It most definitely affects his school life, i.e. answering questions during class.
With kickball, he also had the delay problem. He took too long to figure out if a serve was suitable, took too long holding the ball before throwing it back to the person pitching, etc. But at least he could play! I had to watch some of the other kids get frustrated with him for taking too long, but at least he could play. I don't blame them for getting frustrated with him! I get frustrated with this delay thing too! Lucky for Will, he doesn't seem to notice this frustration.
Last year, when I was trying to teach him baseball (a sport we have since given up on), when I would play catch with him, he would catch the ball but take forever to throw it back to me. So I tried counting to "3," and he would "lose" if he didn't throw the ball back before I reached the number three. This seemed to help with the "delay" thing. I just played catch with a football with Will tonight, and he didn't have any delay. This is a new occurance!
If any of you have any of your own ideas about how to work on the "delay" problem, I am all ears!
posted by Kris @ 4:48 PM
2 comments
2 Comments:
This 10 second delay is what my husband does when you ask him a question. It drives me crazy because I think he hasn't heard me, is deliberately ignoring me, or just really uninterested in the question. I don't know what to do , but I would guess that for me understanding is the key to my problem. Working on this problem in childhood would seem to be the perfect thing to do.
The first thing that comes to mind (the teacher in me - grades 7-12, then college for 22 years) is to sometimes play a "how fast can you answer"game, just to get him used to replying right away. Obviously some things need to be thought out, so you don't want him to blurt out just anything. How about stalling techniques where he learns to answer, "Let me see..." "That's an interesting question," or even repeats a part of the question back. Just don't let him start answering everything with "I don't know." And, of course, he needs to understand (at what age I'm not sure) that other people are going to be impatient with him or start ignoring him when he doesn't answer right away.
Hi Kris,
My Aspie kidlet (17yo boy) has this delay too, and I consider it a blessing....most of the time. His brain uses this time to process his thoughts. His responses are deliberate and well thought out. Aspies work out the questions in their heads and don't answer until they are satisfied with the answer (even if its one we don't like). They are quite thorough and that's why they need more time during test-taking.
As for the ball-playing delay...my hubby is a soccer coach and he uses a drill that is awesome. Its to promote passing so that there is no "ball hog". Even though its soccer, the drill is using your hands. When the player is passed the ball, they have to 'freeze' until they pass it to the next person. They can't move their feet from that spot. The other players can knock it out of their arms if they can, but the point is to get it into the goal by passing it to your teammates. So the player who has the ball is constantly looking for someone on their team who is "open". Try it, its fun!
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