what strategies have been utilized in the classroom to educate individuals with autism

tags: Center for Innovation and Leadership in Special Education Linking Research to Classrooms: A Blog for Educators

By Erin Richmond, Chiliad.Ed., Young man at the Center for Innovation and Leadership in Special Teaching at Kennedy Krieger Institute
April 18, 2017

Welcome back! Hither is Function II of the Inclusion Guide! Simply to reiterate, the prevalence charge per unit of autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is currently estimated to exist one in sixty-viii (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2014). The To the lowest degree Restrictive Environment (LRE) under Thought mandates that children with ASD should have the opportunity to exist educated with typically-developing peers to the maximum extent possible. As a result, more students with autism are existence included in the general education setting. At that place is no magic. The skillset and open mindedness of a teacher will help maximize success for students with autism in the inclusive setting. Here are some strategies for including children with autism in your classroom.

Behavior Supports

Neitzel (2010), explains "Engaging in disruptive and other challenging behaviors is not required for a diagnosis of autism; however, children and youth with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) are particularly at risk for developing at least one challenging beliefs that interferes with their learning and evolution" (p. 247). Interfering behaviors could be repetitive, stereotypical behaviors (i.e., rocking, paw flapping, pacing, etc.) or disruptive behaviors (i.eastward., aggression, tantrums, etc.).  Behaviors occur for a reason and serve a purpose or function. Teachers should employ a positive, proactive arroyo to addressing behaviors in the classroom. Nearly chiefly, collaborate with qualified individuals in the building and brainwash yourself on prove-based strategies.

• Celebrate and build strengths and successes – Strive to give positive feedback more frequently than correction or negative feedback
• Preference Assessment – Comport a preference assessment to determine which reinforcers volition motivate the kid
• Await for Triggers and Develop a Program – Work with your school psychologist, behavior interventionist, and/or special educator for strategies on how to determine the function of the beliefs and to implement strategies for replacing the behaviors. These qualified individuals tin can help conduct a Functional Behavioral Assessment (FBA) and develop a Beliefs Intervention Programme (BIP).
• Implement the Behavior Intervention Programme – This programme is in place to provide a clear, consequent series of steps for addressing behaviors of business within the school building
• Listen and Validate – The pupil's emotions are real. Admit how the child is feeling and provide a prophylactic space to let the child to share his fears, worries, or perceptions of an consequence that happened.
• Choices! – Koegel, Singh, and Koegel (2010) provided bear witness that giving children choices related to their bookish tasks improved several aspects of their performance. When given choices, the children initiated writing and math tasks more rapidly, completed the tasks faster, decreased their disruptive behaviors, and demonstrated greater interest in the tasks.
• Clear, consequent expectations – Bear witness or tell your student with autism what you expect using visuals, photographs, or video models

You lot are i of the biggest supporters in the life of a kid who has autism. You take strategies to back up a student with autism in communicating their interests, wants, and needs. You are familiar with proactive behavioral approaches for making a child available for learning and setting up them for success. You have ideas for fostering friendships and realizing the vitality that a pupil with autism brings to an inclusive classroom. Embrace the wondrous revelatory moments that await you and your student with autism. Not every day volition be easy. Not every moment will go smoothly. However, if you embrace an inclusive mindset, believe in yourself and in your student with autism, and utilize this guide as a resource, I hope you lot will be in for a gratifying journey.  In Part II of the Inclusion Guide, I will share strategies for classroom temper and organization, seating alternatives, visual supports, transition strategies. In addition, I will share strategies for utilizing fascinations, areas of expertise, and strengths to heighten bookish pedagogy, minimize feet, encourage friendships, and more.

Classroom Atmosphere and Organization

Some children with autism may have sensory processing deficits which is the disability to answer appropriately to ordinary experiences when the central nervous system processes sensations inefficiently. Wigham et al. (2015) explain that "sensory input can be experienced as heightened and unpleasant, or alternatively as reduced; and has been conceptualized as sensory under responsiveness or sensory over responsiveness to stimuli" (p.943). Lisa Carey, Education Consultant for Kennedy Krieger's Eye for Innovation and Leadership, wrote an informative weblog postal service nigh designing inclusive classrooms! Check it out! Here are some additional strategies to consider using in the classroom to accost sensory processing difficulties:

• Lighting – Lower levels of light, let child vesture sunglasses or a chapeau, consider seating surface area, use colour overlays, experiment with natural light
• Audio – Reduce classroom dissonance (carpet, lawn tennis balls on chair and desk legs), employ a soft voice, earplugs or headphones, change the sound (if a child does not like clapping you tin can introduce class to the sign for clapping in American Sign Language), allow the child to listen to music, look for ways to avert exposing the child to loud noises, encourage self-advocacy
• Smells – Restrict utilize of perfumes and other related products, seat student near the door or a window
• Temperature – Encourage to dress in layers so they tin adjust to the temperatures throughout the day, permit students to have a water bottle
• Exist mindful that many children take constructive ways for coping with problematic lighting, sounds, and smells . Pay attention to their strategies and avert interfering if possible.
• Requite everything a identify
• Avoid visual overload
• Designate active learning areas – consider creating a "sit to learn" area and a "move to learn" (a child who paces could have a designated area that may exist less distracting to other students)

Seating Alternatives

Imagine beingness on an aeroplane where you feel closed in and exercise not have plenty leg room, ora meeting where you lot have to sit on a hard, metallic chair for hours. No doubt you have felt some level of discomfort and were unable to pay attention to things going on effectually you. Consider this when organizing your classroom for a student with autism. Many of these seating choices may entreatment to other students equally well!

• Seating alternatives – Rocking chair, beanbag chair, couch, loveseat, exercise ball, Hoki stool, seating cushions, chair wedges, bungee chairs, resistance bands for chair legs
• Floor – Give students the option to piece of work at their desk OR the flooring (particularly when working in groups or while working on a big project)
• Allow students to stand – Raise a tabular array or desk-bound to standing summit for students
• Placement of desks or tables to promote learning and positive behavior
• Reduce distractions – Provide desktop study carrels or a tranquility place for privacy and work when needed
• Create a homey retreat – Course pet(due south), water feature, magazines/books, photo albums of students
• Set articulate, consistent expectations if yous provide a variety of seating options for your class .

Visuals, Visuals, Visuals!

A picture speaks a k words! Apply them whenever and wherever you can.  Visual supports assistance maintain a child'south focus and involvement.

• Visual Parameters - Setting parameters involves using visuals to set clear boundaries around items or activities and to communicate bones expected behaviors, like waiting (i.due east., using a finish sign to mark when an item or activeness is available or not available)
• Visual schedules –  Visual schedules increment predictability for students with autism. Schedules tin be used to visually communicate upcoming events, facilitate transitions between activities, and increase pupil independence (Crosland & Dunlap, 2012).

Smooth Transitions

Hume et at., (2014) explain that "despite the routines that many teachers develop to facilitate efficient transitions and maximize instructional time, many learners with ASD continue to struggle with change during the day. As a consequence, these students require even more than construction and thoughtful planning to be successful" (p. 35). The authors shared several steps to support transitions in the classroom.

• Stride 1: Identify problematic transitions – Identify when, where, and with whom the challenging transitions occur
• Stride 2: Select Appropriate Transition Supports
  • Priming consists of assuasive a student to preview information or activities before the student actually engages in that activity (i.due east., preview futurity events such every bit a fire drill, substitute teacher, field trip, or rainy twenty-four hour period schedule, and so they get more than predictable) (Crosland & Dunlap, 2012)
  • Visual timers assist students with ASD "run across" how much time remains before an upcoming transition
  • Visual countdown systems (i.e., 3-2-1 numbered countdown) helps a student "see" how much time is left without a specific time increment
  • First-then charts with a sequence of 2 activities assistance some students with ASD better predict what will take place during the twenty-four hours
  • Utilize apps and other resources (i.e., Pictello, iPrompts, Video Scheduler, Vis Timer, VoCal, to name a few)
  • Read the total article to encounter pictures of examples!
• Stride 3: Implementation of Supports – Decide how supports will be introduced and implemented (i.due east., the roles, when it will be used, etc.)
• Step 4: Collect Data and Problem Solve for Successful Transitions –  Use data to consider changes as needed, every bit well as create a fade plan if students are showing progress with transitions

Recognize and utilize student'due south strengths and interests

Paula Kluth and Patrick Schwarz wrote "Just Give Him the Whale!": twenty Ways to Utilise Fascinations, Area of Expertise, and Strengths to Support Students with Autism. Students with autism take fascinations, areas of expertise, and strengths tin be used to learn standards-based content, develop social connections, minimize anxiety, expand communication skills, boost literacy learning and mathematics skills, and more. Hither are a few wonderful ideas from this resource:

• Consider using a classroom theme related to student's area of involvement (i.due east., if a child likes roller coasters then desks tin be "cars," assignments can be submitted to the "ticket window," rules tin exist presented as "attending riders, please keep in mind a few rules for your condom and comfort …")
• Find reading materials related to student's fascinations, allow students to write well-nigh interests in a journal, involve favorite characters or objects in the act of reading or as part of math story problems
• Search curriculum for natural areas to teach nearly the student's favorites (i.east., if a student loves vacuum cleaners, this topic tin can be featured in a unit on inventions)
• Review math curriculum to notice any areas that might intersect well with students' interests (i.e., favorite foods to teach fractions, use a student'south proper noun and favorite things in word problems, favorite foods or objects for i-to-one correspondence, etc.)
• Visit the UDL Digital Resource Roundup and UDL Classroom Materials Padlet for ideas for engaging and individualizing instruction all students, including those with autism!

In addition, remember to …

• Reject the deficit model and assume competence
• Seek professional development (Honestly Autism 24-hour interval is a wonderful conference in the Baltimore expanse that is held annually
• Do not work in isolation and seek back up from parents, special educators, beliefs interventionists, school psychologist, etc.
• Try co-pedagogy with a special educator!
• Exist creative and take risks
• Develop and maintain strong partnership with families
• Use prove-based strategies
• Share the knowledge and encourage an inclusive school culture

For more than inspiration on inclusive mindset, watch the following TED Talks on YouTube!

• The Power of Inclusion (Aaron DeVries)
• ​Every Child Needs a Champion (Rita Pierson)

​Because of the tremendous diverseness amid students with autism, there is no "1-size-fits-all" strategy. The attitudes of the teacher tin determine the success or failure of the pupil with ASD in the inclusive classroom. If teachers provide a nurturing environs, implement testify-based strategies, and ready suitable but challenging expectations, student with autism will thrive in the areas of socialization, communication, and academic accomplishment. Snowfall (2017) perfectly sums it upwardly:  The all-time way teachers tin can foster a love of school and learning in students with autism is to be "nowadays, patient, and trusting – to learn from them what they need" (Snow, 2017, p. 30).

References:

Crosland, Chiliad., & Dunlap, G. (2012). Effective strategies for the inclusion of children with autism in general didactics classrooms. Behavior Modification, 36(3), 251-269.

Dawson, H. & LaRon, Southward. (2013). Teaching students with disabilities efficacy scale: development and validation. Inclusion, 1(three). 181-196.

Hume, Thou., Sreckovic, M., Snyder, K., & Carnahan, C. (2014). Shine transitions: Helping students with autism spectrum disorder navigate the school day. Teaching Exceptional Children, 47(1), 35-45.

Kluth, P., & Schwarz, P. (2012). "Merely requite him the whale!": 20 ways to use fascinations, areas of expertise, and strengths to support students with autism. Baltimore, MD: Paul H. Brookes Publishing.

Kluth, P. (2010). "You're going to dear this kid!": Teaching students with autism in the inclusive classroom. Baltimore, Physician: Paul H. Brookes Publishing.

Koegel L, Singh A & Koegel R. (2010). Improving motivation for academics in children with autism. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, forty, 1057-1066.

Maich, Thousand. & Belcher, C. (2012). Using movie books to create peer sensation nigh autism spectrum disorders in the inclusive classroom. Intervention in Schoolhouse and Dispensary, 47(four), 206-213.

Myles, B.S., Trautman, M.L. & Schelvan, R.S. (2004). The hidden curriculum: Applied solutions for understanding unstated rules in social situations. Shawnee Mission, KS: Autism Asperger Publishing Company.

Neitzel, J. (2010). Positive behavior supports for children and youth with autism spectrum disorders. Preventing School Failure, 54(4), 247-255.

Prevalence of Autism Spectrum Disorder Amidst Children Aged 8 Years – Autism and Developmental Disabilities Monitoring Network, 11 Sites, United States, 2010. (2014, March 28). Retrieved March 18, 2017, from https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/ss6302a1.htm

Snow, C. (2017). If you evidence up, they'll surprise yous. Educational Leadership, 74(7), 30-34.

Wigham, S., Rodgers, J., South, M., McConachie, H., & Freeston, M. (2015). The interplay between sensory processing abnormalities, intolerance of uncertainty, anxiety and restricted and repetitive behaviours in autism spectrum disorder. Journal of Autism Developmental Disorder, 45, 943-952.

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Source: https://www.kennedykrieger.org/stories/linking-research-classrooms-blog/supporting-inclusive-education-students-autism-spectrum-disorder-part-ii