Improving Social and Play Outcomes for Students With Significant Disabilities During Recess.

For students with autism, recess is often a missed opportunity to develop social competence and relationships. Although interventions have been developed to promote interactions and social skills for students with average or above-average intellectual functioning, there has been less focus on students with autism who have below-average intellectual functioning or who meet the criteria for intellectual disability. In this single-case design study, we tested the efficacy of a combined peer-mediated and social skills instruction intervention on the interactions, play, and social skills of three students with autism who met their state's criteria for alternate assessment for students with significant cognitive disabilities. Social skills instruction featured video models that portrayed same-aged peers demonstrating individualized social skills on the playground. For all three students, there were substantial increases in interactions, play and social skills, and students and their peers provided positive feedback about the intervention.

Self-management of vocational skills for people with significant intellectual disabilities: A systematic review.

Access to employment opportunities is associated with increased quality of life for people with intellectual and developmental disabilities; however, many adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities struggle to find employment. One reason they may have difficulty achieving employment is an inability to work independently. Self-management interventions have been used to promote independence in the workplace for people with intellectual and developmental disabilities by involving them in changing their own behavior. In this literature review, we identified 47 peer-reviewed, single-case design studies in which researchers investigated the use of self-management interventions as an intervention component to improve the vocational skills for people with intellectual and developmental disabilities. Visual analysis of the data indicated that most participants were successful at improving skills related to on-task behavior, task completion, independent transitions, and self-initiations. Potential directions for future research and implications for practice are discussed.

Teaching academic skills to students with significant intellectual disabilities: A systematic review of the single-case design literature.

Students with significant intellectual and developmental disabilities deserve access to instruction on academic skills in addition to functional skills. Many teachers, however, report challenges with identifying appropriate evidence-based practices to teach academics to these students. The purpose of this systematic review was to summarize and analyze literature on academic instruction for students with significant disabilities. Two hundred twenty-two articles with 225 experiments utilizing a single-case design and published between 1976 and 2018 were included in the review. Visual analysis indicated that, in most cases, interventions enabled students to make progress on targeted academic skills. The majority of studies focused on basic reading skills and included participants with moderate disabilities. Most studies used a combination of three or four evidence-based practices, with modeling, prompting, visual supports, time delay, and reinforcement being the most frequently used combination across studies.

Brief Report: Improving Social Outcomes for Students with Autism at Recess Through Peer-Mediated Pivotal Response Training.

Many students with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) struggle to appropriately interact and play with their peers at recess. In this pilot feasibility study, we tested the efficacy of practitioner-implemented, peer-mediated Pivotal Response Training (PRT) with 11 elementary and middle school students with ASD. Participants were randomly assigned to a treatment or control group. We measured outcomes at multiple time points, and analyzed data using multi-level modeling with time nested within student. We demonstrated large and statistically significant increases in peer interaction (d = 1.13). Appropriate play with peers also increased substantially (d = 0.89). Practitioners and students provided positive feedback. These findings suggest school staff can feasibly facilitate peer-implemented PRT that improves social outcomes for students with ASD at recess.