College of Education > News > 2011 > June > Extended school year program benefits children with autism

Extended school year program benefits children with autism

Graduate student Lacey Faciane uses an iPad 2 to record students acting out a social story that helps reinforce lessons about interpersonal behavior.

Inside Auburn’s Richland Elementary School, under the watch of several Auburn University undergraduate and graduate students, a trio of 3-year-old children plays on swings, tricycles and exercise balls. What seems like a typical recess period, an opportunity for children to release pent-up energy, actually represents an exercise in “incidental teaching’’ for College of Education students.

The three children are among the 50 receiving extended school year services as part of Auburn University’s 2011 Summer Program for Students with Disabilities. The children, from Auburn, Opelika, Lee County and Chambers County, have developmental disabilities affecting social interaction and communication.

Undergraduate and graduate students in the College of Education’s Department of Special Education, Rehabilitation and Counseling use creative and personalized methods of instruction to help the children learn such things as how to differentiate between shapes, count, use words and behave courteously in social settings. In the case of “incidental teaching,’’ a race around the room on tricycles or a session on the swing includes a reinforcement of earlier lessons designed to elicit social responses from the children.

“It’s very rewarding because you watch [the children] make progress,’’ said Vanessa Hinton, a doctoral candidate in the College of Education who teaches at Dawson Elementary School in Columbus, Ga. “It’s very important for the child and for the college student. The child benefits from the instruction, but the college student has a chance to employ and put in place the strategies that are discussed in class.’’

The children enrolled in the summer program range in age from 3 to 12. The Auburn students employ practices outlined by the National Autism Center to create a learning environment that fosters academic and personal growth. Dr. Doris Hill, coordinator of educational and community supports for Auburn University’s Center for Disability Research and Service, said the undergraduate and graduate students develop goals for each child based on an Individualized Education Plan (IEP), which includes components devoted to social skills, mathematics and language arts.

“Our ratio is approximately one teacher to two students, and includes much individualized attention,’’ Hill said. “It is a highly structured, highly engaging, positive learning environment.’’

“Extended school year services are required by law when written into a student’s IEP as a service to be provided by the school district,’’ Hill added. “These services help students to maintain valuable skills they might otherwise lose over the summer months. We’re extending the goals that are written into the students’ school Individualized Education Plans.’’

The summer program also serves as an individualized education plan of sorts for the currently-employed and future educators. The Auburn students learn how to collect and apply data related to student progress and utilize emerging technological tools like the Apple iPad 2 for communication and literacy-based learning. In 2010, Dr. Margaret Flores, Scott Renner, and Kate Musgrove, of the Center for Disability Research and Service, began looking for ways to use iPads to help children with autism improve their verbal communications skills and learn appropriate social behavior.

During the summer program, teachers also learn how to connect with students of different ages whose disabilities vary in severity.  For example, graduate student Sara Catherine Patterson has found that engaging pre-schoolers is far different from the processes used with older children. In her classroom, she and her co-teachers sang a song to prepare children for story time (a social skills lesson using video modeling) and rewarded their attention with the opportunity to feed fish in a virtual aquarium on the iPad 2.

There are other lessons that Hill and Flores, assistant professor of special education and Center for Disability Research and Service affiliate, try to impart as well. Pre-service teachers learn to create positive, encouraging atmospheres, to hold themselves and each other to high standards and to become passionate advocates for students with disabilities.

“It’s important to build collaborative relationships with other teachers,’’ Hill said. “Sometimes you become the school’s expert [on special education] even though you’ve just graduated with a bachelor’s degree.’’

Last Updated: Jun 29, 2011