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Providing Security and Safety for an Autistic Child?
"Here is the issue. I have three children and a very loving, hard-working wife at home. My oldest child is a nine-year-old girl, and then I have my eight-year-old Autistic son, and then my five-year-old son. The eight-year-old presents the challenge. If you can imagine a two-year-old mentality in an eight-year-old body then you will begin to understand the issues that we face. This child is intelligent and determined, but he doesn't talk and he doesn't understand us when we talk to him. He doesn't understand fear and he doesn't understand pain. I have seen him play in the snow for twenty minutes, barefoot before we realized he had gotten out of the house. His only complaint was that we made him come back into the house to warm him up. The security in my house needs to be done in such a way that my nine and five-year-old can get in and out, without compromising the security in such a way that the eight-year-old can get out. I also need to do this on my own. Our efforts to get assistance from our local government agencies have failed.
We have tried chains, but he just unlatches them. We have tried keys but the kids (nine- and five-year-olds) either leave them where he can reach them, or they lose them when they need to use them. We have tried keypads, but he ate the buttons off of the first one that we bought. The new one had plastic buttons but after two weeks we found that he would look over the five-year-old's shoulder and read the code as he punched it in. The other two kids mean well and they understand, but let's face it, they are typical users. If the security is too hard to deal with, they won't. They won't close the door if they have to find a key to open it again. Besides, these kids need a life too and I cannot put the responsibility of the Autistic child's safety on these kids. It's too great of a burden and they are just kids. I need a solution that is transparent enough that they can live with it and robust enough that he can't break it. The keypads worked great but are just too easy for the Autistic kid to defeat.
I have looked into biometrics but everything that I have found only locks one direction and was expensive. I need something that will lock in both directions and can be done with less then two weeks pay. I am really hoping that someone here will have a creative, effective, and realistic solution that I can get running in a reasonable amount of time. My wife is pulling her hair out and will have a nervous breakdown soon if something doesn't happen.
I sincerely thank you for your time, your efforts and your ideas."
A dog might be trainable to watch the kid and bark if there's a problem.
Find a task that one child cannot do, such as (I would assume, read) This after all I believe what you are searching for, some method to tell a difference between the children, either with posession of a key or a certain fingerprint.
Get one of those rollup "indestructible" keyboards that they sell (I think tiger.com still has them)
Use a monitor to ask an easy question known to someone who could read.
(What color is the sky ? , How many fingers do you have ?, etc)
Without the ability to read one could not answer the question on the keyboard and could not unlock the door.
The only downfalls that I can see are the possible costs of interfacing the software with the locking door and the computer/monitor/keyboards.
It would probably be much cheaper then a biometric system but would be a little less fault tolerant as it is homebuilt.
Specifically, I'm thinking of the stuff my high school chemistry teacher rigged up. He was a very bright guy, and had a very limited budget. He found ways to rig up cheap versions of very expensive scientific equipment. He usually did so with parts from Radio Shack and old computers that the computer lab was throwing out.
I would suggest getting an led, and a detector, having everybody in your family put their finger in between and see how much light each transmits. You would have to find a way to disable access for one while allowing access for four. If the differences are great enough, that would work. Just have everybody in your family stick their finger in a hole. You might want to work with pinky fingers so there is only one finger that will fit.
How about a scale on each side of the door? It would be easy to defeat for a regular person, but I'm not so sure for an 8 year old with autism. Again, you only have 5 people to worry about, not a lot more.
Almost any non-biometric system won't match your criteria. And of course, biometric is going to be too expensive for the most part.
You might consider (if you have a cheap PC laying around or one that can dual-purpose for this) using one of the cheap thumbprint scanners available for PCs. You'd just have to rig a little custom code and you could make it so that a valid thumbprint raises a signal on a parallel port. From there it would be easy to make a small relay control box to unlock a magnetic latch.
In windows these things are used for windows login. I don't know if any come with an SDK you could use for this. On linux the only hard part would be making sure you have a driver to understand the scanner, the rest would be cake to integrate.
11*43+456^2
I've seen variations of this selling in the stores for automated locks for pet doors. There's a little magnetic key that goes in the collar that triggers the locking mechanism so that your pet can activate the door, but other things do not.
;) - but that this might be a set of equipment that can be easily hacked apart to make bracelets or something similar for your kids.
The reason I bring this up is not to compare your kids to animals
Not sure what they cost, but I'd imagine it is easily within the "two weeks pay" limit.
Since kids are bigger than your average cat, I'd imagine they'd have to hold the bracelet to the sensor as opposed to just being in proximity to the door, but should still be workable nonetheless. My guess is that the circuitry isn't incredibly advanced, as it is designed for pet-size doors, therefore the security is probably pretty light (ie. limited number of codes - if any "codes" at all) which trigger the lock. You're not worried about a person getting through that 6"x10" hole, and raccoons aren't very good with electronics.
Should be worth a look as a starting point, though.
Good luck.
In case of a fire or some other emergency, a stranger to the building needs to be able to exit.
Joe
Joe Batt Solid Design
In particular, this looks like it might be an ideal solution.
Beauty is in the eye of the beerholder.
You have my sympathy, my wife is a professional in the field of autism and I realise how wearing it can be for the parents of children with autism. However I'm not sure that locks are the answer. While I can see the attraction, and probably the need for such a system, I worry that the authorities and social services might not. A possible alternative might be the type of sensor system that they use for store security. If you could get your son to wear a tag then you would be alerted when he leaves the house, and be able to take action accordingly.
Perhaps combining a computer with image recognition software and a scanner could be used. The scanner could be contained in a box with a hole just big enough for a hand and fore-arm. The image recognition software could be trained to recognize a unique hand shadow made by the 5 or 9 year old, which even if the 8 year old learned the gesture, his hand shadow would hopefully by sufficiently different to disallow his access. This system could be rekeyed frequently to allow for growth, 'cracked' keys, etc.
Here is a similar system applied to controlling a cat door. LINK
Joe
The first thing that came to mind was RFID. If you have each child wear a watch with an RFID unit, then you can detect who is at or near the door. If there's no RFID unit, the door stays locked.
Of course, you'll have the same problem here that you have with other methods - the autistic child will learn and understand what makes it work, and the other children may not be responsible enough to make sure he doesn't have access to their watches (or whatever article of clothing you may attach the RFID to).
You can train the other children that if their watch opens the door for him then their priveledges of moving freely (ie, having a 'working' watch) will be limited for a period of time. They will learn to protect and secure their watches after a time.
The underlying issue, though, is that you cannot protect one child and completely free the others from the same protection. It's obviously an ideal for you to do so, and inexpensively, but it's simply not going to happen. Raising a child is not just a parental responsibility/burden, but a family one. As much as you'd like to keep them from bearing such a burden, it is unaviodable.
Since your autistic child cannot speak well, you may want to look into voice recognition technologies. Children are very flexible, and your other two children should learn very quickly to be able to say a simple phrase that will unlock the door for a period of time. You can change the phrase as frequently as needed to prevent your second child from learning it, but not so quickly that your other children tire of learning the phrase so often.
This can be done on the cheap, and coupled with another method, such as RFID or a keypad, could work very well. Microsoft has a free speech SDK which allows one to develop fairly robust speech applications (both talking and listening) with tools as simple as Visual Basic. Since it's a simple windows API, you could probably even use perl or another language you already know to interface with it. The API is built into XP and later, the SDK is freely downloadable from their website and will install the runtimes necessary for win9x if needed.
You might even consider a 'turing test' type of system. Put a few hundred very simple questions in the system. They press a button, it asks them the question, and they give an answer. Since the speech program as speaker independant, it should be fairly robust. You'll need to choose your questions carefully, and change them from time to time. It can be thought of as a teaching tool, even. Make sure the questions are simple enough that you don't have to program too many possible 'right' answers (put 5 pictures on the screen - ask what color the bird is type of thing).
This question intrigues me. I'd be interested in the final solution - or if you need help with any hardware (and possibly software) issues I may be able to do so. You can find my email address at my website http://ubasics.com/adam/electronics/.
Good luck!
-Adam
I'm brainstorming here; I have no experience with your needs, but maybe this idea helps. What I see from your summary is the need for reliable in/out door security that distinguishes between users without input from the users themselves. I remember an earlier Slashdot item about a pet door that was activated by a collar on the pet yet kept out racoons and other local pets but allowed the owner's pet to go through. You mentioned that the kids would lose or not secure a key; perhaps a wearable key like a bracelet or necklace might be more difficult to forget or exchange.
I can't say that I don't give a fuck. I've just run out of fuck to give.
You mentioned biometrics would be good, but they only work in one direction. Well, the problem is the child getting out of the house, I assume, and you're never trying to keep him from coming in. So the biometric security needs only to be for the inside going out, and a normal deadbolt lock for the other direction.
But, like other people suggested, probably an alarm of some sort would be better than an actual locking mechanism, as far as safety is concerned.
If you want to make an apple pie from scratch, you must first create the universe. -- Carl Sagan
If he can think enough to read over the shoulder of your other kids to learn the codes, he is just going to break any sort of fence you put up for him.
In short, follow the RFID lock suggestions given here. That should help out, but it may be only a matter of time before he picks up a carelessly left bracelet.
This sig no verb.
If the child unit strays more than 1 to 9 meters (your choice) from the parent unit, or if the child unit is turned off, the parent unit makes some noise.
It might be possible to rig it so that the child unit turns off if the child tries to remove it (by attaching it to your child by a wire that is connected to the battery, so that if the wire is broken or unhooked, the circuit is broken and the unit turns off).
It's not quite the same as keeping the kid locked in, but it will at least alert you if the kid goes too far away.
One Solution. Seriously though, I agree with some others that maybe locks aren't the answer. A co-worker suggests a monitoring system that allows whoever is supervising the kids to know either where your son is at all times (the house arrest bracelet) or know when and which doors are opened. The little magnetic switches for each door could set off a unique sound and / or flash sequence for that exit. Extend the system to transmit to a pager like device, that way you are notified even if your attention is elsewhere. Modify something like these car alarm pagers to show you which exit is being used and whoever is watching the kids will know exactly what is going on.
Bleh!
In many electronics do-it-yourself magazines you can find schematics for RFID readers that can connect to an electric door using cheap parts. The watches cost about 45 USD maximum. And kids will love the designs...
Since the watches are read from a distance, there is a large chance that your 8-year-old won't even notice that the watch is the key to the door.... Good luck! Please let us know what you eventually choose!
You could go a step further, and attach some sort of biometric device to the main doors that disables the sound temporarily if the fingerprint or voiceprint matches. You wouldn't need the device on each side of the door, but it wouldn't hurt.
Hooking a biometric device to a buzzer sounds a lot easier and safer than hooking it to a lock. You might be able to find one that stands alone and doesn't need to be hooked up to a computer. Or, you might be able to hide a small, old computer near the main door and use a computer-connected fingerprint scanner or something. Then you'd have to figure out how to get the computer to disable the buzzer, but that shouldn't be too tricky.
I worked for four years in a group home for children with developmental disabilities. Several of our children had issues with elopement and I understand how stressful it can be monitoring children who like to run off but don't understand that traffic is dangerous etc...
At the group home in which I worked we had a gate which required a semi-complex procedure to open, one had to lift a ring, turn a knob, and slide the handle of the gate all the way to the left in order to open the latch. I could possibly diagram the mechanism for you if you were interested. This would probably not work for your child if he is able to observe and remember keypad sequences.
As for the RFID devices, what about attaching or implanting them in the shoes of your children? Most children only have a few pairs of shoes and they aren't likely to be leaving the house without them. Nor is it obviously apparent to your other child what is unlocking the door (especially if you can get your children to be nonchalant about the device)
I had a foster brother that we were scared would kill us at night while we were sleeping. That's kind of scary, but our problem was similar to yours. We needed to keep only him in his room at night, but in case of an emergency, we needed for him to be able to pass through the door to safety. That's what we thought the problem was.
But really, the problem was that we needed to be awake when he left the room to ensure our safety. So my mom and dad bought a sensor that would detect when the door opened. The sensor was on the outside of door and could be turned on and off by the parent. (The sensor is out of reach because of it's height, and because you can't open the door without setting it off.) When the sensor sensed an open door, it set off an alarm that woke everyone in the house up AND the next three houses down. This type of system is available at radio shack for $20.
Result, foster brother learned very quickly that at night he could not open the door without triggering the alarm. And the alarm was loud and annoying. So it was very good in training certain behaviors. (The loud noise is almost like a pain stimulator in modifying behavior).
In short, put a sensor on every door and window in the house, like your standard security system. You can probably do this within your budget if you install it yourself and don't subscribe to a monitoring service. You can even drill the sensors into the door and the door jam to deter tampering when he gets old enough to tamper. You don't need to keep your son in the house, but you do need to know if and when he leaves. With such a system, you will know.
This will require for some adjustments in your living habits. Ie, your other kids won't be able to run in and out of the house (that will save you some heating bills too). They may have to ring the doorbell to come back in from playing, to avoid setting the alarm off, and you may have to get up to temporarly unset the alarm. But they will learn that very quickly as well, as the loud sound is as affective as a pain motivator in modifying behavior. Also, strangers will be safe as well in your house. If a fire breaks out, they can still physically exit your house, although a loud alarm will go off.
Finally, you and your wife can affectively keep the secret code to the alarm safe without burdening your kids with remembering it or protecting it. You can also set the alarm up to simply chime when a door or window is open. Maybe, you can find a system that allows you to set a very loud chime, or you could even place speakers in every room of your house.
This isn't the sig you are looking for... Carry on...
A few posters have mentioned having the system "fail safe" in event of a fire, with various hairy methods to let them detect the fire alarm. Bear in mind that most smoke detectors designed for permanent installation have some sort of "daisychain" output so all alarms sound if one sensor triggers. You could use this to release the doors.
"You can train the other children that if their watch opens the door for him then their priveledges of moving freely (ie, having a 'working' watch) will be limited for a period of time. They will learn to protect and secure their watches after a time."
You nasty bastard,
Let's say that the other two children have an 'issue' with the Autistic child, becuase of attention, 'nauty ness/getting away with more' or whatever kids have issues with.
Your 'training' aproch will just engcourage them the be nasty.
Now on the birghter side, lets say that's not the case and all the kids are happy.
when one of them want to go out, but isn't alowed to what are the other kids going to do, help them, be upset?
I'm no child expert, but it looks like your suggesting kiddy war.
I would do something like,
Go out any play with the kids a bit more (or play indoors), yeh it takes a lot of time and can be frastrating but your kids will love it.
Have a system were only 'you/a trusted adult' can open the door from the inside but the kids can still get back in. That way your not enforcing any kind of predudice in the kids.
thank God the internet isn't a human right.
Technology to the rescue.
How hard would it be to make the collar bigger?
You can also get the version that has cables at the perimeter of your yard... the kid will never wander out into traffic again.
within in inch of two of the correct height, which would be near impossible to do.
In other words, very possible to do.
...
One of the symptons of autism unfortunately is the lack of attunement with body language, social skills, etc. My general fear is that these are the skills that a sheaperd dog capitalizes on and the best you could hope for would be to be warned if there was a problem.
Ok-- now for the real concerns I have about your sitation--
1) Security is not just about keeping people out, it is about keeping people safe. If you lock everyone in, what happens if your house catches fire? You want to be able to get out easily, even if your security system has failed. So Ideally, failsafe here means when the security system is down, people can leave but not enter. After all, you are trying to keep your son safe, right? If your main issue is your son, it may be sufficient to allow people to enter and leave if the security system goes down.
2) If a system goes down and allows anyone to leave, then the question is how attackable it is. Make sure it is not accessible and is physically secure.
3) Keys to security-- My experience with an autistic cousin tells me that if you rely on key codes, he may be able to evesdrop, and if you hide some sort of physical key, he may be able to find it. Biometric might work though...
So, the only system I can see that might meet your security needs would be extremely expensive to design and impliment and would need to be done well and safely. While I wish you luck, I do not think that there is a lot today that would meet your needs.
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
Why not use different unlocking mechanisms for the outside and the inside? Standard keys would work for the exterior, and voice recognition should do the trick for the interior.
I see. wow. That is tuff.
:-(
It sounds like you need nothing short of a cage
I hope you find a solution.
This isn't the sig you are looking for... Carry on...