PBS champions Autism Awareness Month
A special episode of PBS’s “Xavier Riddle and the Secret Museum” hinges on the principle that “sometimes people think and do things differently, and that’s OK.”
But Temple Grandin knows firsthand that varying modes of thought are more than just OK. They’re essential to human progress. “If you get the right teams of people to do things that have complementary skills, it can really, really make for great things getting done,” the animal-welfare scientist, author and autism activist told the LA Times on a recent video call from her home in Fort Collins, Colo.
“We need the different kinds of minds. ... Often, educators concentrate too much on the area of deficit and not enough on the area of skill.”
Multiple PBS series are celebrating Autism Awareness
A young Temple Grandin appears in a special episode of PBS’s “Xavier Riddle and the Secret Museum” in honor of Autism Awareness Month.
Month in April by spotlighting new autistic characters, including one based on Grandin. The 73-year-old professor of animal sciences at Colorado State University appears as a child in the aforementioned episode of
“Xavier Riddle and the Secret Museum,” which premiered last week and is available to stream in full on the PBS Kids YouTube channel.
Additional reruns of the “I Am Temple Grandin” episode are
slated to air April 22 on all PBS stations and April 30, May 1 and May 2 on PBS Kids.
“I Am Temple Grandin” sees its principal trio of curious kids — Xavier, Yadina and Brad — time-travel through their secret museum portal to visit a younger version of the titular scholar in 1953 Massachusetts. There, a cartoon Grandin teaches her guests that “sometimes people think and do things differently” by showing them there is more than one way to fly a kite.
While Xavier, Yadina and Brad stand still and watch their kites float directly above them, Grandin attaches her homemade “bird kite” to her bicycle. The other children look on in awe as Grandin’s kite glides through the air in her wake — a soaring testament to the creative power of divergent minds.
“I liked the fact that it highlighted I like kites,” Grandin told The Times after viewing the episode. “I was very good with kites. Liking kites is something that’s a positive thing. And I used to spend hours tinkering with different kinds of kites to get them to work. A lot of kids today are growing up, and they don’t tinker with things anymore. They’re too afraid to make a mistake.”