Drumbeat Autism Outreach Podcast

In this episode, we’re joined by Joseph and Olive from the Drumbeat Autistic Young Experts Panel to talk about masking. They share their experiences with honesty and eloquence, offering powerful insights into what masking means for autistic people. This was a special one for us — our first time recording in a professional podcast studio. Huge thanks to Jason and the team at Creative Kin for welcoming us and making the day run so smoothly (check them out at ⁠creativekin.co.uk⁠). For more about Drumbeat Autism Outreach, visit ⁠linktr.ee/drumbeatoutreach

In this episode you will hear from 8 autstic young people from years 4 to 6 who access Athelney Primary School Resouce Base talking about their "Friendship Group". The interviews go off on wonderful tangents, but mostly focus on the subject of Frienships; what it means to be a good friend and how might we go about making friends. There is also a lot of wonderful chat around Special Interests as the young people delight in telling us all about their interests, hobbies and talents. Released during Autism Acceptance Week 2023, this podcast is the our first recording in a Primary School setting, and serves as a wonderful insight into the sometimes complex matter of making friends at Primary School through the eyes of autstic young people.If you want to find out more about Athelney Primary Schooland the resource base please go to; https://www.athelneyprimary.org.uk/If you wish to find out more about Drumbeat Autism Outreach please go to; https://linktr.ee/drumbeatoutreach

Welcome to this special episode of the Drumbeat Autism Outreach podcast which has been released during Anti-Bullying Week 2022 and focuses on the prevalence of bullying in relation to autstic young people’s school experiences. We know that a very high number of autstic young people experience bullying in school and as part of Anti-Bullying week, which runs from 14th to the 18th Novmber 2022, we wanted to explore this unfortunate link between autism and bullying. In this episode you will hear a recoded conversation between Sonia Gannon (Drumbeat Lead Teacher) and Madelaine Hardy. Madeline Hardy joined Drumbeat Outreach last year as a paid intern. Madelaine took an interest in Anti-Bullying Week because of her own personal school experiences, and from seeing and hearing similar experiences from the young people she has been working with. In this episode, Madelaine talks to Sonia about her own primary and secondary school time as an autistic young person who experienced bullying, and they also discuss results from a Bullying survey. For more information on Anti-Bullying week go to: https://anti-bullyingalliance.org.uk/anti-bullying-weekFor more information on Drumbeat Autism Outreach go to: https://linktr.ee/drumbeatoutreach

In this episode of the Drumbeat Autism Outreach Podcast you will hear from 4 young people who attend Bonus Pastor Secondary School in Lewisham speaking about Anxiety. To start with you will hear from regular hosts, Charlie and Pete and also from another Drumbeat Autism Outreach team member Wendy, who organised and ran the group at Bonus Pastor. The young people offer an incredible insight into the feeling of anxiety, what might trigger them and how they manifest. They also talk about things that might help them when they are feeling anxious.If you want to find out more about Bonus Pastor Secondary School go to https://www.bonuspastor.co.uk/Throughout the episode you young people refer to their “5 point scale”. You can find out more about “the incredible 5 point scale” by going to https://www.autismempowerment.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/Incredible-5-Point-Scale-Fact-Sheet-rev.pdfThis episode is the second episode looking at autism and mental health, if you want to hear more from the Drumbeat Autism Outreach team about Mental Health have a listen to Episode 6 https://spotifyanchor-web.app.link/e/0V9yyMHZwtbIf you want to learn more about Drumbeat Autism Outreach and access their online resources go to https://linktr.ee/drumbeatoutreach

In this episode of the Drumbeat Autism Outreach Podcast we continue our discussion around autstic young people;s experiences when transitioning from Primary School to Secondary School. Our excellent guest this episode is Ellena Valizadehtalks. Ellena talks us through some really interesting and important research where she interviewed autstic young people about their experiences around transitioning from primary into mainstream secondary school. Ellena introduces us to the idea of the "three houses" (which we used in Episode 9) and talks us through the findings of her research and implications for practice.Throughout Episode 9 and 10 of the podcast the "three houeses method" is referred to. A version of this template can he found here: https://www.mefirst.org.uk/resource/me-first-three-houses-tool/If you want to learn more about Drumbeat Autism Outreach go to https://linktr.ee/drumbeatoutreach

In this episode of the Drumbeat Autism Outreach Podcast you wil hear from 14 autstic young people who go to Deptford Green Secondary School. They speak about their own experiences transitioning from Primary School to Secondary School. We are very excited to bring you this episode as it is the first full episode of the podcast focusing on the voices of young people, and it has pathed the way for future episodes!If you want to find out more about Deptford Green Secondary School and their resources base go to https://www.deptfordgreen.lewisham.sch.uk/ and if you want to learn more about Drumbeat Autism Outreach go to https://linktr.ee/drumbeatoutreach

Welcome to our Autism Acceptance Week 2022 podcast special. This episode is split into three parts all focusing on Empathy and Acceptance. In Part 1, co-host Pete Black recites his spoken word poem entitled "empathy", written from the persepective of an autistic young person. In Part 2 we hear from a handful of autistic young people who go to Deptford Green School who we will be hearing even more from in future episodes. And finally in Part 3 we hear excerpts from previous interviews with guests Emme Watkins, Matthew Green and Joanne Limburg which highlight the need for empathy and acceptance. The following links are mentioned in this podcast; Pete Black's original youtube performance of "empathy": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cRl6xarnjbs "Live" podcast recording version of "empathy": https://youtu.be/eKtwk9euex8   More infomation about Autism Acceptance Week: https://www.autism.org.uk/get-involved/raise-money/world-autism-acceptance-week-2022 Drumbeat Autism Outreach online resources: https://linktr.ee/drumbeatoutreach

In this weeks episode you will hear a fascinating interview with Joanne Limburg focusing on her collection of poems called the "The Autistic Alice". Joanne is a writer who has published a number of books including poetry collections for adults and children and two memoirs. Joanne received an autism diagnosis in adulthood. We invited Joanne onto the podcast to read some poems from her book "The Autistic Alice" and using these as a starting point she discusses her own experiences as a girl and young woman growing up with undiagnosed autism. As Joanne discusses in the episode, she often identified with Alice from Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass as "a logical and curious child adrift in an arbitrary world". In this episode, Joanne, Pete and Sonia explore many aspects of autism, including the masking, developing different identities and autistic joy. Below are some links to Joanne's website and to ‘The Autstic Alice’ on amazon, and also a link to all of our drumbeat autism outreach online content, including our website, facebook and instagram.  Joanne's website: http://joannelimburg.net/ "The Autistic Alice" on Amazon Drumbeat Autism Outreach online resources: https://linktr.ee/drumbeatoutreach

The Drumbeat Autism Outreach Podcast is put together by a team of autism specialists working in the Lewisham area in London, and this podcast is aimed at parents and professionals living and working with autistic young people. In this episode, hosts Pete & Charlie interview Matt Green. Matt is a school counsellor who works within a specialist school supporting young people with a range of neurodiversities, including many autistic young people. Matt explores some of the main sources of anxiety amoungst the autstic young people he meets, some of the main ways in which his approach may be adapted when counselling autistic young people and offers some practical advice for parents and professionals working with autistic young people who may be unhappy, anxious or depressed.Some useful links from this episode: If you want to find out more about the Drumbeat Autism Outreach Team, you can find their website and socials here: https://linktr.ee/drumbeatoutreach  More infomation and resources relating to Mental Health and Autsim can be found on the National Autism Society website https://www.autism.org.uk/advice-and-guidance/topics/mental-health and more general infomation can be found on the 'mind' charity website https://www.mind.org.uk/information-support Our recommendation of the week this week is the neuroclastics website which is described as "a collective of Autistic people responsive to the evolving needs and trajectory of the Autistic community... publishing autistic voices, we are cataloguing the intersectional experiences, insights, knowledge, talents, and creative pursuits of Autistics" https://neuroclastic.com/

Welcome to Episode 4 of the Drumbeat Autism Outreach Podcast. In this episode we explore tabletop role playing games, and why they might be both appealing and potentially also beneficial to some autistic people. In this episode we welcome our special guest, Emme Watkins, who joins us all the way from LA! We want to assure you that no prior knowledge of tabletop role-playing games is required in order for you to gain something from this episode - in fact to the contrary we hope that this episode will be an introduction to listeners who know nothing of this particular subject. We feel that whilst the subject itself is quite niche, our discussion covers some very universal ideas around autism which include ideas around roleplaying, structured social time, the comfort of rules, storytelling and of course special interests and the communities around them.This episode kicks of with a conversation where I explain to podcast regular Pete my reasons for wanting to do a whole episode about TTRPGs.  We assume that most listeners, like Pete, know absolutely nothing at all about this subject, so fear not, the first section will hopefully give you a little bit of a sense of what it is all about! Following that, you will hear our interview with Emme Watkins. Emme is an autistic tabletop role playing gamer who is part of a group called the “Adventures Pack” who produce a bunch of online content relating to both Dungeons and Dragons and TTRPGs in general. Emme agreed to talk Pete and I about her own experiences and explore some of the connections between tabletop roleplaying games and autism.