Web conference archive: Inclusion strategies for students with autism spectrum disorders

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February 2011

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52:24

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In the classroom

Archive of the web conference “Inclusion Strategies for Students with Autism Spectrum Disorders,” which took place Feb. 7, 2011. This web conference accompanies the article by the same name.

Transcript

Automated voice (00:00)

Recording started

Bobby Hobgood (00:03)

Good afternoon, and welcome to this web conference sponsored by LEARN North Carolina. This afternoon’s session is entitled, “Strategies to Include Students with Autism in the General Education Setting.” We’re very happy to have with us the author of the article upon which this web conference is based, Ms. Susan Flynn. And Susan’s going to introduce herself and start talking with you in just a moment. And then when Susan finishes, we also have with us, a teacher who was featured in one of the videos that you saw associated with that article, Maureen Ostrander. And Maureen is here to also answer questions this afternoon. So I’m going to ask everyone, if you would please to join me in a virtual round of applause and welcome Susan Flynn. Susan, we’re glad to have you this afternoon. Go ahead.

Susan Flynn (01:13)

Thank you so much. Can everyone hear me? Give me a check mark if you can, please. Okay, great. Thank you so much. I am very glad to be here and to talk about this subject, inclusive strategies for students with autism. And just a little bit about myself. As you can see on the screen, right now, I’m a full-time graduate research assistant at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte in the Department of Special Education and Child Development. I have a master’s degree in special education, focusing on severe profound disabilities. I also have an A license in behavioral and emotional disabilities as well.

(02:00)

Before becoming a graduate research assistant at UNCC, I was a former inclusion teacher, a resource teacher, and a self-contained teacher for students with autism spectrum disorders at the elementary and secondary levels, and just currently, my interests are individuals with autism spectrum disorders, applied behavior and analysis, assistant technology and inclusion, evidence-based practice, different research methodologies and then functional research communication training. So that’s just a little bit about myself.

(02:42)

And I’m sorry. Did you want to go ahead and introduce Maureen?

Bobby Hobgood (02:48)

Yeah, Maureen, we can go ahead and do that. Let’s go ahead and I’ll switch to that slide, and Maureen, we’ll have you introduce yourself as well. Go ahead, Maureen.

Maureen Ostrander (03:01)

Hi everybody. My name is Maureen Ostrander. I am currently a teacher in a self-contained classroom for students with ASD. Previously I studied speech language pathology at ECU, and I’ve also studied special education in Connecticut. I’m currently getting my certificate of behavioral interventions in autism and that goes towards my master’s in curriculum and instruction. And I’m really excited.

Bobby Hobgood (03:44)

Great, Maureen. Thanks so much. Okay, Susan, we’re going to go back to you now.

Susan Flynn (03:51)

Great, thank you. Okay, let’s get started. As mentioned before, we’re discussing implementing inclusive strategies for students with autism. Just some quick notes about autism. Autism is among the most common developmental disabilities. Approximately one out of every hundred-fifty children. It’s one of the most common developmental disabilities in the world affecting approximately one out of every hundred-fifty children and one in seventy boys. It’s the second most common developmental disability, even more common than Downs syndrome.

(04:27)

Between twenty-five thousand and thirty thousand individuals in North Carolina have been diagnosed with the disorder. The symptoms and characteristics of autism can present themselves in a variety of combinations and with a range of severity, from mild to severe. So two children with the same diagnosis of autism can act very differently from one another and have very different skills, abilities, and function levels.

(04:54)

Okay, here you see some common characteristics of individuals with autism. They basically fall under three categories, which are social interaction, behavior, and communication. Social interaction pertains to different characteristics such as the individual appearing to be withdrawn and avoid eye contact. They may seem insensitive or unemotional to other people’s feelings by a lack of facial responsiveness. A lot of students with autism have separation anxiety and or stranger anxiety. And a lot of students, or individuals with autism desire to play in isolation; they prefer to be by themselves and avoid contact with peers.

(05:41)

Under the behavior domain, these individuals may resist changes in routine. They may have abnormal responses to one or a combination of senses such as hearing, touch, sight, smell, taste, reaction to pain. Some students are oversensitive to pain, and some students may be under-sensitive to pain, and they have a hard time expressing that. They also may appear to have unreasonable fears without regard to real dangers. For instance, I’ve had students that I’ve known to leave the house at home and run out to the street with no regard to cars coming. It can be a pretty dangerous issue there.

(06:24)

And under the domain of communication, a lot of these individuals have difficulties expressing needs appropriately. So instead of you know, signing or verbal requesting that they need a drink, they may hit themselves because they lack that ability to appropriately communicate. Some verbal abilities are quite delayed, especially in the lower functioning population of students with autism. Usually students with Asperger’s Syndrome, which also falls under the umbrella of autism, usually have advanced verbal abilities.

(07:04)

Other examples of communication issues are inappropriate laughing, or echolalia. For instance if you asked them a question such as, “What is the correct answer, A or B?” they may say “A or B” because they’re just repeating what you say. They may not understand humor or sarcasm, could have difficulty with pronunciation and/or grammar, and difficulty with language pragmatics. For example, a child with autism may understand, “give me a hand” as actually removing an actual hand and giving it to someone. And also, a lack of imagination, abstraction, or emotion.

(07:48)

Okay, in regards to successful inclusion, there are three main things you need to think about when talking about students with autism. You always need to presume competence, design access to academics, and then tackle challenges with creativity and optimism. And we’ll go into more detail on these three different domains. So when we’re talking about strategies for presuming competence, it’s good to have — first look at your attitude. Practice saying, “How can this student be successful?” “What can I do to make this happen?” Also, question stereotypes. Everybody has them. How someone looks, talks, or walks does not always reflect what they think and feel. And a good example of this could be, just because a student with autism does not give eye contact, it does not mean that he or she is not listening.

(08:45)

Also look at what is age appropriate. And that basically refers to speaking in an age-appropriate tone and about age-appropriate topics. For example, don’t talk about Barney with a middle-school student.  Just think about, what are other typical students talking about at that age?

(09:09)

Also, when you’re looking at presuming competence, it’s good to learn to communicate using the person’s preferred method of communication, whether that be verbally, American Sign Language, even just learning a couple of signs, picture symbols to communicate; some students use speech-generating devices or voice-output devices. Also, a good thing to do is to teach peers and others to learn how to interpret potentially confusing behavior. For instance, a student laughing in the classroom at an inappropriate time may just be a sign of anxiety. And also, this is very important; do not speak in front of someone as if they were not there.

(09:58)

Other strategies for presuming competence, assume benefit from learning academic curriculum. It’s what some of us call the least-dangerous assumption. If they are not presented with material, then they will not learn.  And we cannot say that they cannot learn unless we try.  Also, look for evidence of understanding. For instance, a student with autism can demonstrate knowledge in a variety of ways, such as pointing to the correct answer, selecting the picture of the correct response, things like that.

(10:33)

Support students to use their strengths. A lot of individuals with autism have very strong visual strengths, so it’s good to incorporate those things in, when you’re teaching that focuses on those visual strengths. And then finally, acknowledge the person with a disability’s presence in the same way you would interact with anyone else.

(10:56)

Okay, the second domain to successful inclusion is design access to academics. And this basically focuses on Universal Design for Learning, or UDL. Can everyone give me a check if they have heard of UDL?

(11:23)

Okay, good, we’ve got some check marks there. Great! Basically, it’s a way that educators can customize their teaching for individual differences, and it offers the following: Multiple means of input or presentation to give learners various ways of acquiring information and knowledge, multiple means of expression to provide learners alternatives for demonstrating what they know. For instance, if a child has problems or difficulty with writing, maybe they can use a computer to generate their responses. And then multiple means of engagement to tap into learners’ interests, and challenge them appropriately, and motivate them to learn.

(12:11)

Okay, key strategies for providing access to academics. The student should be seated with his or her peers unless they need the time away. However, it is important to work with the student to be with the peers but sometimes, an individual with autism may become overstimulated and they need a little bit of time away, and it’s good to give them that time. But always bring them back to the instruction. Students must have access to communication at all times and in all places. And this basically means some kind of portable communication such as picture symbols that the student will be using frequently, maybe pre-programmed answers to questions and a speech-generating device. Also, modeling respectful interactions. This is very important for the student’s peers to see, and in addition to, for the student with autism.

(13:10)

Provide wait time. Sometimes this is one of the hardest things to do. We are — we expect students to, I guess you would say typical peers, to quickly respond when they are — when they know the correct answer. Sometimes students with autism have a hard time processing your — the information, or the directions given. So it’s good to provide a wait time of at least five to ten seconds to give them a chance to respond. Also, it’s good to act as an “Advance Agent.” This is great. It, for example, I’m going to — telling students, “I’m going to call on you for number four.” That’s preparing them to answer, which also can cut down on the wait time because they’re already preparing to answer the question, and it reduces anxiety for the student.

(14:06)

Also, when talking about design, designing access to academics, it’s good, it’s really good to use students’ fascinations and specialty subjects. For instance, if the student just loves computers, maybe incorporate that into teaching. And then use active learning structures to help students engage in curriculum and connect with peers. Cooperative learning is a good example of this. Other active learning structures could be response cards, teaching the student with autism to use response cards, pre-set-up choices on the speech-generating device, again, choral responding, guided notes, a lot of things you would use for students with learning disabilities.

(14:52)

Also, it’s a good idea to provide agendas, schedules, instructions, and clear expectations and to pair these things with pictures if helpful. These things are very important for students on the spectrum since they do have the visual strengths. Also allow for breaks and movements, just like you would for a child with ADHD, and designate a place or a routine for this to occur.

(15:26)

Okay, and a couple more things, or, three more things to do for designing access to academics. Use graphic organizers. This has been proven through research to really help students with autism visually organize information such as your Venn diagram. Brainstorms, word banks, and sentence starters, maybe cloze sentences. As far as technology, it’s good to provide support for students with autism using programs such as Co-writer and Kidspiration. Also supporting students to point to answers and showing their understanding in new ways. As you see, this is a common theme throughout these slides here.

(16:12)

And finally, it’s important to tackle challenges with creativity and optimism. Families and teachers must problem-solve together. And this ensures consistency, that what is taught at school is also taught at home, and expectations for behavior. Therefore, the student can generalize behaviors across settings and not just in the classroom or just in the home. Also, brainstorm a list of possible strategies. Choose the top three to implement and then revisit. See if they implement them and see if they work. If they don’t, come back together and brainstorm some more ideas.

(16:51)

Also, bringing in people who know the child well to help with brainstorming, such as private therapists, family, extended family, CAP workers, respite workers that work with the child, outside of school. And examining the schedule and finding times of the day when the child is successful. Take a close look at what happens during times of success. What is happening at that moment that you feel that is helping the child be successful in the classroom? And then finally, one of the hardest things to do sometimes is to be calm and optimistic. Know that there is always a way to reach these students.

(17:35)

And some recommendations for inclusion for students with autism, to reduce distractions in the classroom setting such as noise or unnecessary visuals, and seating in high-traffic areas, these are things that you want to avoid. Since students with autism are — can be very distractable. Work one-on-one to address students’ need for perfections on assignments. Some students with high- functioning autism, especially, have a need for their assignments to be perfect, and if they’re not, they get very upset and can display inappropriate behavior. So you want to address that up front, so it doesn’t happen. Offer to work one-on-one if everyone else in the classroom is perhaps working on the assignment, you can go over to student and help that student one-on-one. And make modifications to student learning concerning verbal communication skills. So break language acquisition skills into smaller parts, almost like a task analysis.

(18:40)

Also, work collaboratively to build effective IEPs to meet the student’s academic and social goals, such as with a special education teacher, therapists such as occupational therapists or speech language therapists, or maybe with the school psychologist. Utilizing a functional behavioral assessment to analyze behavior and determine the next step. If you’ve read the article, we mention in there about using the ABC form, the antecedent, behavior, and then consequence form, which helps you determine the function of the behavior and then address it at that point. And then along those lines, provide positive behavioral intervention and support. Try to steer clear of punitive consequences unless absolutely necessary, for we’re wanting to teach the students replacement behaviors, or appropriate behaviors, not just to punish inappropriate behaviors.

(19:43)

Using peers can be very effective. Often students respond more effectively when a peer prompts them or helps them, just like really, any other student. Provide — using peers can provide positive interactions and growth for everyone, including the typical peers in the classroom. And using peers as extra support benefits everyone involved.

(20:08)

So, how will I apply this information to my own classroom? These are some things that I would do if I had a student with autism in my general education classroom. I will provide a classroom environment that is not a distraction to my student with autism. This may include locating the student out of high-traffic areas, monitoring the brightness of lights, and controlling unnecessary noises. For example, it’s important to be informed when emergency drills will be taking place due to their noise and disturbance of routine. Personally, I find those fire drills to be absolutely obnoxious, so in some schools that I have worked in — I’m sure Maureen can attest to this — administrators will be good about sometimes calling down beforehand to prepare you for a fire drill that’s getting ready to take place just so you can prepare the student with autism.

(21:07)

Also another good thing to look at would be that your instructions are clear and concise. For instance, I will provide these in a written format as well as using visual images to support this. These images should be simple illustrations and or symbols. And I will continue to experiment with these strategies to determine which works best for the child with autism. Also, I will present changes in routine and/or curriculum gradually. And I can accomplish this through strategic planning and pre-teaching my students, pre-teaching the necessary skills so they can participate. This may include an introduction to the lesson and vocabulary development prior to the entire class. I will also continue my practice of posting a daily schedule on the board. Of course, most of you probably do that anyway, but it’s good to have that up for the child with autism as well, and paired with visual supports such as picture symbols.

(22:05)

I will design the students’ learning so that they have choices. And by providing choices, students will get more involved in their learning and have a sense of control over what they’re doing. And finally, I will continue working collaboratively with my special education teaching team to meet the social and academic needs of my students. This attention to functional — teaching functional skills and monitoring the students’ progress continuously should improve students’ efficacy. And that’s all I have.

Bobby Hobgood (22:45)

Great, thank you Susan. A lot of information there, folks, and we want to let you know that we will make Susan’s slides available to you after the web conference. We have all of the participants’ names here and we’ll find a way to make these slides available to you. Before we take questions and answer, we want to give Maureen Ostrander the opportunity — Maureen, if there’s anything else that you want to add to Susan’s opening remarks this afternoon.

Maureen Ostrander (23:18)

I think Susan did a fantastic job. [break in audio] **but our board and the kids flip the pictures over as the activity finishes. So they know that that’s done, and they can see what’s coming up. And also, I have a couple students that are currently going into classrooms for inclusion and they also bring a schedule with them so they know what is going on in the classroom.

Bobby Hobgood (23:58)

Okay, Maureen, thanks so much. So now we’re going to turn to the Q-and-A part of our web conference this afternoon. I’m going to turn the microphone over to Emily Jack here in Chapel Hill who has some questions that have come in. In the meantime, as you are listening to these questions, as you’re hearing responses from both Susan and Maureen, if you have a question or comment, make sure that you choose from the drop-down box the “submit questions” name that appears in that drop-down menu and then type your question or comment to be read aloud here by Emily Jack here in Chapel Hill. So Emily, what’s our first question?

Emily Jack (24:36)

The question is, “talking about, when giving children alone time, can that be as simple as sitting at a separate table or does that mean in an area with no other students? Also, how do I know enough time has passed to bring the child back to the group?”

Susan Flynn (24:57)

That is a good question. It could be as simple as sitting at another table. You know, if the student is becoming overstimulated or frustrated, you can move the child to another table but it’s always important to think about the function of the behavior. Is the student frustrated and just wants to get out of the work? And if so, you know, you just provide that support. What am I trying to say here? You provide support to that student but you always need to make sure that student returns to the work because you don’t want that student to learn to act out, and send the child away from the work is actually reinforcing that behavior if that makes sense. And I’m sorry, can you tell me the second part of the question?

Emily Jack (25:58)

Sure, so how does the teacher know when enough time has passed to bring the student back to the group?

Susan Flynn (26:07)

Yes, that’s right. Usually if you wait for the student to calm down, if that’s the case. You want to make sure they’re involved in as much academic instruction as possible because these students are definitely capable of it, but unfortunately some of these students have learned ways to get out of work, and successfully. And so these students can be quite smart. So basically, it’s really, it’s up to you. If you see the student calming down, then you offer to help them again and bring them back to the group. It really depends on the situation. There is really no set criteria for how long they should, they should sit away from the other students.

Emily Jack (26:59)

Maureen, do you have anything to add to that?

Maureen Ostrander (27:04)

Usually what I try to do in regards to seeing how long a student should be removed from the group is based on the particular student. I know some students that I have do try to get out of their work, and they’ll become upset so they don’t have to work. And in that case, we leave them out as short as amount of time and then bring them back. And then I have some students who really need a long amount of time to get themselves regulated and then they can come back and finish the work afterwards.

Emily Jack (27:44)

Thank you. The next question is, “I have a kindergartner who is using loud noise along with getting up and walking up to me when I’m trying to talk to the entire class. I have tried asking him to stop, walking away, and completely ignoring him. Nothing seems to stop this behavior.”

Susan Flynn (28:07)

Okay, that’s another good question. That sounds like the function of that behavior — you know, I can speculate — may be teacher attention. And one thing you can do is actually what we would call an antecedent intervention. And that would be, before the behavior even occurs, like if you know this behavior occurs during a certain time, maybe during group instruction or circle time, I’m not sure what age level we’re talking about here, but make sure you go over to the student and provide attention to that student before the instruction starts. You know, just, again, I don’t know enough about this student, but perhaps talk to them, give them some attention, just them a tickle, anything like that, and then bring the student to instruction. And what we call functional communication training would be if that doesn’t work, you can have the student request, appropriately, for some attention. And that could be as simple as handing or showing a picture symbol card of talk or something like that. And then when the teacher comes to a break in instruction, that teacher maybe can come over and give him a pat on the back or something like that. Let me think if there’s anything else. I mean, there are a couple different things you could try. But I would definitely ignore the inappropriate attempts at attention which would be the vocalizations or the getting up and walking to the teacher while the teacher is delivering instruction. I hope that makes sense.

Emily Jack (29:55)

Thank you. I think that was helpful. On the topic of the picture symbols, we have an elementary art teacher who wants to know, would it be best for her to construct these visual symbols for the student, or is it best for the student and the teacher to work on this together?

Susan Flynn (30:20)

Wow, I mean if the student definitely has the ability to be involved in that, I would definitely involve the student in that. That would be great. Also, you can get help from the speech pathologist in this case or the special education teacher or the parents to see what that student uses at home and just so we can keep the mode of communication system consistent across all settings, if that makes sense.

Emily Jack (30:52)

Thank you. Maureen, do you have any thoughts on that question?

Maureen Ostrander (30:59)

I definitely think that having the student work on visuals is a fantastic idea, if that’s possible for them. Usually my students that I have right now aren’t able to make their own, but we rely on the speech therapist, or we make them ourselves, and some parents actually offer to make them at home too so that everything is the same throughout each environment.

Emily Jack (31:29)

That’s great. Thank you. I think that’s a very important point about having the consistency across environments. A teacher has a question about fire drills. She says, “a practice where I work is to take some children out of the classroom to avoid the noise. But should the child be exposed to the sound so that he or she knows what the sound is? Or could the teacher keep the child near the door to exit quickly?”

Susan Flynn (31:58)

I know there’ll be a lot of opinions on this one. Some teachers like to take their students out before the fire drill since they are given advanced notification to avoid the noise. But here’s my thing with that: If — you need to think about the student as he or she gets older. Is there always going to be advance notice? Is there always going to be, is that just going to be feasible in the natural environment? Probably not. So I think it’s good, as painful as it may be to these students, to let them learn that the consequence of hearing a fire drill is to leave the building at that point. But, the last thing that you mentioned, keeping the student close to the door, yes. As soon as the fire bell rings, take them out. But I think the cause-and-effect relationship of the fire drill sounding and the individual leaving the building should be taught to the student. And I think if you walk them out before that happens, you’re missing out on that teaching opportunity.

Emily Jack (33:15)

Thanks. Other thoughts on that question?

Maureen Ostrander (33:21)

I also agree with Susan. We try to keep our students near the door. We put their coats on if it’s cold before we know the fire alarm is going to go off. I also look at it as a safety reason and what if we do have a fire in the school? They’re not going to know what that noise is if they don’t hear it during practice.

Emily Jack (33:45)

Great, thank you. We have a teacher who would like Susan to speak about how to engage gifted autistic students.

Susan Flynn (34:00)

Oh yes. That’s a very interesting subject. And I’ve had a few students that also have been gifted. These students, I would say, normally are close — are on the high-functioning autism spectrum or Asperger’s, and these students usually have — I would say more so with Asperger’s syndrome, have no — let me see, what am I trying to say here? I would say average to above-average IQs, which you know, I’m not sure about reliability of IQ measures for students with autism, but I won’t go there. But it’s important to keep them engaged, obviously, as with any child who is gifted. And that’s where you can consult with the gifted — if you have a gifted teacher in the school, and the special education teacher. Even though they may be academically able to, what am I trying to say here? Engage in the academics, they will have, they will still have social and behavioral needs that need to be met. With these guys, I would say I’d just keep them constantly engaged and, you know, that could be giving them extra work that may be on an interest of theirs that they can write about. What are some other things? Can I think about that one? and I’ll get back to you. Let me think about that one, and I would like to return to that question if I could.

Emily Jack (35:56)

Sure, thank you. In the meantime, let’s pose that question to Maureen. What are your experiences with that? Have you had any particular success stories?

Maureen Ostrander (36:10)

I think when I’m working with students who are gifted, it’s important to let them exhibit their abilities and the stuff that they’re really great at. Maybe let them do a special project that they can show to their classmates, and that can also help with their social skills. And help provide extra support for any weaknesses that they might have, such as their social or behavior skills. And it’s definitely important to collaborate with your TD teacher.

Emily Jack (36:44)

Great, thank you. The next question is about the IEP. What role do IEPs play in the role of instruction with autistic students?

Susan Flynn (37:02)

What role do IEPs play in the instruction of students with autism? Well, again, it really depends on the level of support the student is receiving. But generally, the IEP goals are shared and hopefully the general education teacher is involved in IEP meetings. But they’re shared with the teacher. The teacher can keep these IEP goals in mind when instructing the students. And these IEP goals do not need to be taught separately from the curriculum. They can be embedded in their curriculum such as, let’s say the student has an IEP goal of answering WH questions. Obviously there are many, many opportunities to embed those types of goals into the general education instruction.

Emily Jack (38:02)

Thanks, Susan. Maureen, how about you? What do you have to say about the IEP process?

Maureen Ostrander (38:11)

It’s definitely important for everyone involved with the student to be writing the IEP. I actually have a student now who is going to be moving from self-contained to inclusion for the next school year. And we’re really trying to keep his goals in line with what the other students in the class are doing and not make it look obvious that he might need extra help. So like Susan said, with the WH questions, that’s something you can work on all through the day and it won’t be visible to other students, and they’ll still think of him as one of their regular classmates.

Emily Jack (38:51)

Thanks, that’s a good and an important point. The next question comes from a teacher who teaches a social skills class for behavior-disordered students” “One of my students is classified as autistic. His only behavior issue seems to be melting down on occasion. How do I keep him from picking up on the negative or inappropriate behaviors of some of the other students in that social skills class? He’s very high functioning.”

Susan Flynn (39:31)

Well I guess I would say to — in that type of classroom, you’re always trying to model good behavior and have contingencies in place for good behavior. If the main concern for that student with autism is, I guess what we’re saying is imitating the other students’ behavior, I think that’s what I got from that question. Just have contingencies in place or reinforcers in place for him not engaging in that behavior, just like you would the other students in the class. And I guess, I don’t know if this would be the appropriate time, but do we know what the meltdowns, why the meltdowns are occurring?

Emily Jack (40:21)

I’ll leave it to the teacher who posed that question if you want to write a follow-up about why those meltdowns are happening. In the meantime, perhaps Maureen can speak to that. Have you had any issues with students — high- functioning students with autism who might bet imitating the negative or inappropriate behaviors of other students?

Maureen Ostrander (40:52)

I think it’s important to reward the students for their positive behavior. So like say they’re doing something that no one else is doing, but it’s a great thing, “Oh, I liked how they’re raising their hands,” or “I like how you’re sitting in your chair.” And that way you’re not drawing attention to negative behavior but the positive behavior.

Emily Jack (41:20)

Thank you. And now we do have some follow-up from the teacher who wrote that question, and she says that the meltdowns seem to occur because of change. It also seems that no one has ever told this student “no.”

Susan Flynn (41:38)

Okay. So change. Yes, that’s definitely, definitely, an issue with students with autism. A lot of students with autism have difficulty with transitions or any kind of changes in the routine. And that’s why it’s so important to warn the student ahead of time that this is going to happen and have visuals available for the student to see what you’re talking about as well. Also, you may have heard about social stories. “This is what I do” — and it’s written in the child’s perspective. For example, “this is what I need to do when English — I’m just thinking off the top of my head here — language arts is being changed to music. This is what I need to do to handle the situation.” These have been effective. You can look at books through Carol Gray. I don’t know if this teacher has heard of that but that offer some very, very helpful social stories for different situations. And to just piggyback on what Maureen said, which is great, is, don’t draw attention to the negative behavior and really, saying “no.” I would refrain from doing that. Just to tell the student what you want them to do and to reward them, that student for that appropriate behavior.

Emily Jack (43:06)

Thanks, Susan. I like that you talk about social stories. For those participants who haven’t read that article, we have some great examples of social stories that were actually provided by Maureen and those are embedded in the article, so we would encourage you to go and read those. Another thing that Susan mentions in the article is this notion of interpreting every behavior of an autistic student as an attempt to communicate. And Susan, I wonder if you would speak about that a little bit more.

Susan Flynn (43:53)

Sure, I’d love to. If you think about it, I mean, any form of behavior usually is to communicate something. You know, let’s say, when you were going through your pre-service teacher training, and you’re sitting in a lecture that’s been going on for three hours, and you start tapping your foot and tapping your pencil, getting impatient. You’re communicating that you’re, you’re fatigued. You’re communicating that you’re getting tired and that you would like to stop soon. A lot of these students with autism do not have the ability to express their needs or label their feelings like we do. And, for instance, a behavior can — I don’t want to go too much into function-based behaviors here, but, which we could go on all night about — but a student may hit their head to get out of work, okay? Because the student doesn’t know how to say I need a break.

(45:06)

It is our job as teachers to teach that child to communicate they need a break. And then, and then some people may say “but that’s them getting out of their work.” Well, not necessarily. Would you rather them hit their head and eventually you’ll get so nervous about the child hurting themselves so you will stop the work? Or would you rather teach that child to appropriately ask for a break, give them a break for, let’s say, a minute or two and then bring them back to the — to work. That to me sounds more efficient, and the student is not missing out on instruction that way. I could go on and on about that, the function of behaviors and — but, technically, what we’re talking about here is that everybody uses some type of behavior to communicate. Some are just more appropriate than others, and I hope I answered that question.

Emily Jack (46:05)

You did. Thank you. Another issue that you mentioned in your presentation is that it’s important for students with autism to, to express their interests in age-appropriate ways. I’m curious; how do you balance that with students who are fascinated by, you know, you have that eighth-grade student who is fascinated by Barney? How do you, how do you kind of manage that and, both with that student and that student’s peers, who may not understand?

Susan Flynn (46:45)

That is a tough one. And my perspective on that, and again, this is my perspective, is that we don’t want to isolate the student even further from their peers. And I think, you know, talking about Barney and doing all that in a middle school, it’s just inappropriate. And I think there are ways that we can find other things for the student to be fascinated about, and to expose that student to different things. You know, talking about Barney at home, you know, go for it. Go for it, but in the school setting, I just think that it’s appropriate to try to teach the child — and this is something that you may have to teach the student is — different things to be interested in. And when you get peers involved in this, it can really reinforce the student with autism’s behavior as to wanting to learn about new things.

(47:45)

I hope that makes sense. That’s a really tricky one. We just, again, we just don’t want to single out the child with autism any more than what may have already been done. The student already has different behaviors than the typical peers. You want that student to be involved and included with his or her peers as much as possible. And I don’t believe that talking about Barney would do that. Now, Maureen may have a different perspective on this and we can hear from her, but that’s my perspective on it.

Maureen Ostrander (48:27)

Actually Susan, I fully agree with you. I think it’s definitely important for the kids with ASD to participate in the same activities and try to have some of the same interests as their peers. Another way we can do that is maybe by having their peers share some of their ** with them. So if there is a favorite song that students in a third-grade class has, they can share that song with the student with ASD when they’re included in that classroom.

Bobby Hobgood (49:06)

Great, ladies. Thank you both. Some good advice for dealing with a situation that’s a little challenging. We’ve got a couple of minutes left, and I’d like each our panelists to share with us before we leave today your thoughts on participants who are joining us this afternoon who currently do not have autistic students in their classrooms but anticipate and know that as our classrooms become more diverse, that is a real possibility. Aside from reading articles like Susan’s, how would you encourage an educator who currently does not have an autistic student in their classroom to begin preparing as a teacher in terms of their daily planning, in terms of their instructional practice? And if we can start with Susan on that.

Susan Flynn (50:05)

Sure, again in the presentation earlier, I talked about Universal Design for Learning, or UDL. It’s maybe a good practice just to get into that practice of doing that anyway, providing different ways that students can show their knowledge. Just get into the practice of that, and you know, sometimes the strategies for students with autism, believe it or not, as far as academic instruction, also apply to students with English as a second language, using lots of visuals to help students understand is a good thing. And really, just setting up the classroom to minimize distractions. Again, it’s a lot of the same things you would apply to a student with ADHD. It’s just, maybe, to a different level, if that makes sense. Setting up your classroom, have your behavioral expectations in place, I mean, things you would normally do anyway. You would just have to modify that a little bit for students with autism.

Bobby Hobgood (51:21)

Great, thank you. Maureen, we’ve got about thirty seconds. If you can add to that.

Maureen Ostrander (51:26)

Oh, it’s definitely important. Prepare your students in the classroom of their new student that will be joining them, use a lot of visuals, provide peer buddies, and provide either a break time or a quiet area for the student.

Bobby Hobgood (51:45)

Okay, some excellent advice. I’m going to ask everyone who’s joined us this afternoon if you would join me in a virtual round of applause for Susan Flynn and Maureen Ostrander. Ladies, we appreciate your time and your expertise this afternoon. We got a glimpse, I think, at some really good strategies and insight to what it means to work with an autistic student in a mainstream classroom. Thank you.