Why Johnny Doesn’t Flap book review
Written on 12th Apr 2017 by Alex Lowery
Today, I am reviewing a Children’s book. Have you ever seen those books meant for neurotypical children that are trying to help kids to understand autism? They might have things like “This is my friend Tom. He’s different from me because he has autism”. Well, this is a book that turns the tables (not literally) to help children on the autism spectrum to understand neurotypicals, which I think, is fantastic. There is often a lot of emphases on how autistic people are different from everyone else, but what is often overlooked is that from the autistic person’s perspective, it is really everyone else who is different.
This image is fair used for the purpose of review
The title of the book is ‘Why Johnny Doesn’t Flap: NT is OK’. It’s written by Clay and Gail Morton and Published by Jessica Kingsley Publishers who have published many fairly well known books on the topic of autism. ‘Why Johnny doesn’t flap’ is a fantastic book that would help autistic children to understand how neurotypicals think and behave differently from them. For example one of the pages says, “Johnny is supposed to arrive at 4:00, but sometimes he arrives at 3:58 or 4:03. I gave him a watch for his birthday to help him arrive on time, but he still has this problem”, and there are a variety of other examples the book brings up (which I won’t give away) which show how neurotypicals are different, but it’s always done positively. The pages always ends with “That’s ok” to help the autistic children to accept the differences of the NT.
However, the book is not just good for autistic Children. I think it would also be hilarious for adults. I was reading it while I was on the train (in the Quiet Zone might I add) and found myself literally laughing out loud and was almost unable to stop laughing! That’s how funny it was! I think the people who wrote it had quite a sense of humour. The book is very tongue-in-cheek, and I feel a lot of adults who hear what is normally said about autistics would enjoy reading the book. I also feel like it could help people in general to understand the differences from an autistic person’s perspective. I’d highly recommend reading ‘Why Johnny Doesn’t Flap’. If you haven’t already read it then I would 100% recommend it. I’d definitely give the book a strong rating of 5 stars out of 5 and that’s not a rating I’d give to just any book. Here is the link to it on amazon.
Unless otherwise indicated, all materials on this page are © Alex Lowery Speaks About Autism. Please do not reproduce, modify or use for any purpose without the prior, written consent of the author. If you are interested in using an article on your blog or in your magazine, please contact us.
