ASD child - “he looks through me when speaking to me” ???

[Ricecakesaremyjam]

My son is 5yrs old, diagnosed ASD. His teacher has told me “he looks through me when he talks to me and he has a blank expression when he is stimming”.
I could be wrong but I thought it was common for autistic children to have occasionally blank facial expressions/stare? What is she getting at here?
Thanks for any replies xx

I had a teacher complain how upsetting and frustrating she found it that my seriously ill selectively mute child never spoke. Well fuck me that must have been absolutely awful for her. Fucker. Teachers are not saints and some of them are not empathetic or nice at all. @Ricecakesaremyjam your son’s autistic (asd for me) nothing she described is unusual for people with ASD, and I can’t see that his facial expressions need to be policed, critiqued or “fixed”.

This 100% thank you @WaitingForMojo

Maybe the teacher is concerned because she thinks he is unhappy? She may not be saying his behaviour is “wrong”. I would just explain what is normal for him.

I’d be concerned that she’s his teacher with that lack of awareness. Sounds like she needs to do some more training.

I'd be upset.

All my eldests assessors reported that "he had a blank expression" "he appeared to be looking at me but not engaging, as if he couldn't see me and his mind was somewhere else" this was mentioned in every report.
To say he looks straight through me by a teacher I'd instantly react like I feel like she's saying he's rude/bad mannered or ignorant. I'd be asking her to explain herself better and be complaining about her lack of understanding tbh

You don't get to decide that.

Potato - potato...
I only heard about it the other day. Makes zero difference to me but there is a whole movement of autism activism of which I am decisively not a member so I guess it matters to some people.

I was more just challenging that poster's assertion that using ASD is now ring, it certainty isn't wrong to use it in any way whatsoever

It's not ASC now; that is just the preference for some. Personally, I prefer Autism being used.

If his behaviour is challenging, she may be listing something she feels has changed - maybe he seems less engaged, less inclined to share his inner world. I agree her phrasing isn't great and it's not clear this behaviour is actually causing problems?

Top of the list of traits/tips I give all my DS's teachers is something like "DS doesn't display typical listening behaviours even when he is listening very carefully, so you need to confirm verbally that he's heard and understood." We also got "whole body listening" taken off his targets because as long as he's retaining information as best he can and not disturbing others, it's not a problem. We can work on appearing to listen if he wants to when he's older, and when it's less important that he actually takes the teacher's words in rather than worrying about if his eyes are looking in the right place.