(playful humming)

- This is Julia.

She is a four year-old autistic Muppet.

(chuckling) The first of her kind.

She has a stuffed bunny that she is very fond of.

- There's lots of ways friends can play.

Where's Baby David?

Peekaboo! (laughing)

- [Laura] And she likes to paint.

- Well, who's this?

- Oh, this is our friend, Julia.

- Oh, hi, Julia.

I'm Big Bird.

Nice to meet you.

- [Laura] But one of her favorite things to do is to sing.

- Let's sing together.

♫ Twinkle twinkle little star

♫ How I wonder

- If somebody has a limited verbal ability,

from autism or from something else,

we kind of can't help it, but we automatically assume

that they know less or that they certainly can show us less

about what they know.

(gasping)

(blowing)

- Bubbles?

Bubbles?

Bubbles!

- I'm trying, but well, blowing doesn't always work.

- Teachers need to understand that their kids

probably know a lot more than they can show,

and if you take the assumption

that your students are competent and eager to learn,

want to learn, if you work from that assumption,

the students are gonna do a lot better in your classroom.

- Thanks for that tip, Julia.

You were a big help.

- One of the mistakes that teachers and kids both make

with autism is assuming that if the student with autism

isn't able to answer you immediately

or doesn't make eye contact or follow you around

on the playground, then they don't wanna play

or they don't wanna be friends.

And so peers and teachers sometimes just give up

and leave the child with autism alone.

(laughing)

- Hi, Julia.

Well, you seem excited.

What's going on?

- Play, play, play!

- Oh, you wanna play?

Well, sure!

What should we play?

Kickball?

(sighing)

Oh, okay, maybe not.

Well, how about hide and seek?

- So if the peers understand, oh, she does wanna play

with you, she just doesn't know how,

or you might wanna wait a little longer

for her to answer before you run off

and do your own thing.

That is active teaching of acceptance

and is good not only for the kid with autism,

but also for their peers.

- It's okay.

(breathing deeply) Sometimes friends like different things,

so it can be hard to figure out what to play together,

- Some young kids may be very sensitive to sound.

Some kids with autism are very sensitive

to having too many people in their room.

They might cover their ears or not be able to speak

in front of a lot of people.

If you have a student that's experiencing some overload,

the first thing to do is to ask the student what might help.

- [Man] "So what should we do next?" asks Elmo

"Snack!" says Julia.

So the three friends go to Hooper's Store.

But inside Hooper's Store, Julia seems scared.

She claps her hands over her ear.

- Often teachers will have a little beanbag chair

that's maybe under a large table

so you're kind of blocking the lights and some of the sound

and the student can kind of take a break.

I think Julia has a really unique message to give

and a really unique place in our society.

She's gonna hopefully be a member

of our community now for a long time.

- See that?

We helped each other, Julia.

And that's what friends are for.

- Friends are for.

(playful shrieking)

- (sighing) Oh, Julia.