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69 %u00a9 Elklan Training Limited 2025Elklan Supporting Gestalt Language Processing %u2013 a Total Communication ApproachHyperlexic children and young people may benefit from colour coding question words for reading comprehension tasks (see Colourful Semantics, page 82). They can then highlight text in the corresponding colour in the body of the text to help them to answer the question. For example, if asked %u2018Who is the main character in the story?%u2019 (colour-coded orange), they highlight names in the story orange. (Note: The child or young person would have to be introduced to and understand Colourful Semantics before understanding which colour is associated with which semantic role within the text.)8.8 EARLY SUPPORT FOR SOCIAL SKILLSHistorically children and young people with social interaction needs were taught social skills such as taking turns to initiate a conversation, have good turn-taking skills within a conversation and be encouraged to make eye contact. It is now recognised that this approach does not accept differences and this does not represent neuro-affirming practice.Positive opportunities around social interaction can be fostered by supporting adults taking time to engage and talk about the child or young person%u2019s interests and/or preferred activities. If children or young people with the same shared interest attend a setting, then provide opportunities for them to access their shared interest together. Research by Crompton et al (2020) suggests that autistic individuals communicate more with autistic partners than with non-autistic peers.A child or young person may show through their communication and/or behaviour, the situations in which they feel the most comfortable communicating. Using a visual %u2018metre%u2019 to help them demonstrate their different levels of comfort might be helpful. The child or young person%u2019s use of language to describe the levels can be mapped onto the visual to individualise the approach.Visual Metre to show levels of comfort in social situations. The example includes the language a child used to describe the different levels.Anxiety metre