PANAMA CITY, Fla. (WJHG/WECP) – Breakfast Point Academy teacher Grace Owens answers her 4-5 grader’s questions about autism.
Thursday is World Autism Day and Owens is celebrating not only the day, but Autism Awareness Month with her class.
“They’re asking questions about autism, so I thought well what we’ll do a nonfiction study about autism, we’ll break it down into its parts and then we’ll try to explain it to them in their language,” Owens told NewsChannel7.
The school’s principle gives her the flexibility to adjust her teaching style and follow her classes’ curiosity, Owens explained.
“They’re going to create their own poems about autism so therefore we’re learning all about our ELA skills, we’re learning a little bit of health science because we’re talking about a medical condition and we’re also talking about character ed,” Owens explained.
A fun aspect to Owens’s classroom is having her son Cullen Casey’s class right across the hallway, she said.
“We like to do activities, so they have more social experiences with each other,” Casey said.
Plus, Owens said she gets to see who her future students will be.
“And we talk constantly so I get not only get to have a great relationship with him and I can invite his kids to my plays and special events and vice versa but also because I get to meet the kids that are coming up,” Owens said.
Owens’s class is holding a special event on April 16 where they’ll be talking about historical figures who had autism, she said. They’ll also perform a play and one of her students will sing.
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