Autism : Julia Donaldson has cast a spell and awoken language, joy and contentment

Julia Donaldson has cast a spell on my grandson, an autistic boy with limited speech and some would say an alarming propensity for wriggling, jumping about and refusing to sit in one place for more than a second or two! And yet .... Julia Donaldson has somehow managed to calm him, encouraging him to sit, to listen, to gently turn a page and experience the joy and peace that comes from reading and sharing a book.

I remember with great sentiment the nightly ritual of reading a story to my own children, something I suspect I took for granted at the time. For my grandson books - although plentiful in our home - were something to destroy, to hurl or ignore but that changed when he discovered Julia Donaldson and her book Room on the Broom.

This book has cast a spell so powerful he can recite every word of it, he anticipates the actions, he throws himself in to the rhymes, and he sits in one place, totally enthralled in the experience.

Whilst I suspect Room on the Broom will be a firm favourite for some time to come, he can recite the words of every children's book she's written, encouraged on by Julia Donaldson and her fabulous characters, he has given to us a tremendous gift.

To hear his voice, so often non-sensical, screaming, loud and unpredictable, form sentences, identify a rhyme, anticipate a plot, to know he understands, takes comfort and joy from a story, sitting quietly in contemplation is the most magnificent experience, an experience I couldn't have imagined even a month ago.

His new found enthusiasm for books, for language, for stories and rhyme, these things feel like a gift of hope; hope that there's more ahead for him. We may not have found the way to unlock all the variations of that hope just yet but we are certainly getting better at finding him, and he is getting better at allowing us to find him. I hope that combined effort continues to open up our world to him, and his world to us.

In sharing this story, I wish only to remind those who are caring for autistic children that the thing which can unlock your child's potential although not visible to you right now, may be just around the corner. Keep searching ......