①April 2nd is World Autism Day. What is autism? Autism is caused by pervasive developmental disorder. Here are main behavior characteristics of autism.
②Social communication disorder, live only in their own world.
③Language communication disorder, difficult to communicate with people around.
④Repeat strange movements often, unable to accept the changes of familiar environment.
⑤From three characteristics above, people with autism have lots of trouble communicating. They look like normal people, but they experience the world in a veryuniqueway. That is to say, the way how they deal with things and understand the world is not the same as normal people.
⑥Nowadays, the number of autism is 67 million all over the world. One in 160 children is autistic. A school in England for children with autism is finding a new use for virtual reality and VR headsets. Priors Court is a kind of school in Berkshire, southern England. The teachers at school are using high technology to help and learn more about children with autism. As children with autism have problems with places and situations they haven't experienced before well, they like what is familiar and they like their routine. VR headsets make the wearers feel like they are in different places. For example, someone wearing a VR headset can have a 360 degree view of a place as they turn around. With the video, they can even hear the sounds of the place. Teachers are using VR to introduce children to situations like visiting a shopping mall or getting on a plane. They can do so in the safety of their classroom. In addition to getting used to everyday different places in the real world, the children may learn to enjoy new experiences such as skiing or deep-sea diving.
⑦A computer teacher, Nuno Guerreiro from the school said, "We're trying a new data collection system with VR headsets at the same time. The system puts together information about each child every day: what they have eaten, how much sleep and exercise they have had and all their activities. Then it compares those facts to know how they are behaving for medical treatment." Guerreiro added the school hoped to share what it learned. "Hope to not only improve people to know more about the treatment and research of the autism, but also draw people's attention to care about autism."
