Behavior therapy Humanistic therapy
21 dealing with children with special needs and finally she got her Master Degree of
special needs at Montana States University in 1975. She had many experiences in educationpsychology such as Title III
special education
auxiliary in
1969-1972, Title
III special
education teacherlearning support person in 1973-1974, regular education teacher in 1974,
private clinical therapy in 1975-1976, special education teacher in 1976-1977 and etc. Besides, she had also worked as volunteer like consultant with autism unit in
1981-1983, counselor with North Wales Childline in 1987-1991, president of North Wales Childline in 1988-1989, counselor with Samaritans in 1996-1998
and many others. Torey’s first published book was based on her private notes about her student entitled One Child and it became a world best-selling book and
was translated into many languages. Since that, Torey actively wrote many books with same genre such as Somebody Else’s Kids 1982, Murphy’s Boy 1983, The
Sunflower Forest 1984, Just Another Kid 1988, Ghost Girl 1991 and many
others. Novel Ghost Girl consists of 419 pages and it is divided into 27 chapters. Most of the chapters in the novel are full of narration from the teacher’s point of
view and there are some dialogues between the characters. The novel Ghost Girl tells about a psychologist who firstly worked in a
clinic with some psychiatrists and psychologist with ability to deal with some children with special needs. Then, she moved to a little town named Peril. In Peril,
she worked as a teacher for a class with four students with special needs. There were Reuben who had an autistic disorder, Philip who was premature-born from a
drug user, Jeremiah who was really emotional and shrewish, and Jadie who had a
22 selective mutism disorder. Jadie did never speak, even never coughed, laughed,
looked sleepy, and sighed. Further, this novel tells mostly about Jadie. Jadie’s behaviors showed the consideration of abnormal behaviors especially selective
mutism since she refused to speak with other people. Torey tried to approach her and solved Jadie’s problem with courage, compassion and dedication that really
showed the tremendous power of love. Therefore, she tried to reveal the causes of Jadie’s abnormal behaviors by digging Jadie’s past experiences. Finally, all the
causes were revealed, Jadie lived with foster parents and continued her study by going to the public school and she became more open-minded and openhearted as
well, while Mr. Ekdahl was put in jail because the fact proved that Mr. Ekdahl did crimes to an eight-year-old girl.