Targeting Oral Language and Listening Comprehension Development for Students with Autism Spectrum Disorder: A School-Bas
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ORIGINAL PAPER
Targeting Oral Language and Listening Comprehension Development for Students with Autism Spectrum Disorder: A School‑Based Pilot Study Alyssa R. Henry1 · Emily J. Solari1
© Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature 2020
Abstract This study investigates the effects of an integrated oral language and listening comprehension intervention for early elementary students with ASD. Students (n = 43) were randomly assigned to intervention or control comparison conditions, with intervention students receiving instruction in small groups of 3 or 4. Groups were led by special education classroom teachers 4 days per week across 20 weeks in the school year. Significant group differences were detected on measures of expressive vocabulary, narrative ability, and listening comprehension. This study provides preliminary evidence of the intervention’s feasibility and effectiveness for intervening in language and early reading skills for students with ASD. Keywords Autism spectrum disorder · Elementary · Reading comprehension · Oral language · School-based intervention
Introduction Extant data has demonstrated that individuals on the autism spectrum (ASD) experience difficulties in the development of academic skills (Fleury et al. 2014; Jones et al. 2009). These obstacles are evident across the autism spectrum; children who are considered higher functioning, or children with ASD without intellectual disabilities (IDD), often exhibit learning challenges that are discrepant from their IQs (Estes et al. 2011). One particular area that recent studies have begun to document is the development of reading comprehension and its underlying component skills (e.g., Jones et al. 2009; McIntyre et al. 2017a, b; Nation et al. 2006, Ricketts et al. 2013; Solari et al. 2017, 2019). Studies examining individuals with ASD suggest that between 37 and 65% of samples have marked difficulties with reading comprehension (Estes et al. 2011; Huemer and Mann 2010; Jones et al. 2009; Mayes and Calhoun 2008; McIntyre et al. 2017b; Nation et al. 2006; Solari et al. 2019). This is a prevalence rate much higher than in typically developing * Alyssa R. Henry [email protected] 1
Curry School of Education and Human Development, University of Virginia, 405 Emmet Street, Charlottesville, VA 22904, USA
individuals. This increased rate of comprehension difficulties may suggest that there are syndrome-specific deficits that disrupt adequate reading comprehension development (McIntyre et al. 2017b, Nation and Norbury 2005; O’Connor and Klein 2004; Randi et al. 2010). Given the increased prevalence of reading comprehension difficulties in individuals identified with ASD, it has been suggested that there may be deficits inherent to ASD symptomology that also disrupt reading comprehension development (Nation et al. 2006; O’Connor and Klein 2004; Randi et al. 2010). As reading comprehension is a foundational skill that is crucial for academic and vocational success, research-based instructional practices to address the factors under
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