Acquisition and Generalization of Activity Schedules and their Effects on Task Engagement in a Young Child with Autism in an Inclusive Pre-School Classroom

By Gayle Massey, John J. Wheeler. Education and Training in Mental Retardation and Developmental Disabilities, 2000

145 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Efficacy of individualized activity schedules with a 4-year old child diagnosed with autism who attended an integrated public pre-school classroom was examined. Graduated physical guidance and a system of most-to-least prompts were used during skill acquisition stages with teacher proximity and level of prompts being eventually faded. A multiple baseline across activities (work and leisure) assessed performance across baseline, treatment, and maintenance conditions with stimulus generalization being assessed during a third activity (lunch). Results support the findings from MacDuff, Krantz, and McClannahan (1993) in that a child with autism can successfully acquire the skills necessary to independently follow activity schedules and generalize these skills to other settings with minimal training. The study represents an advance in applied research in the use of visual cues with children who experience autism in school settings; most notably an integrated pre-school classroom serving children with disabilities and typical same-aged peers.

Subfields: Clinical Psychology, Cognitive Neuroscience, Developmental and Educational Psychology

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/952591fea8e912a41866af8f9292a8850c3bfaa9

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In Clinical Psychology

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Citations in the corpus

• Comparing pictorial and video modeling activity schedules during transitions for students with autism spectrum disorders (2010, background): “…& McClanahan, 1993; Massey & Wheeler, 2000), increased independence (Watanabe & Strumey, 2003) improved play behaviors (Dauphin, Kinney, & Stromer, 2004; Morrison, Sainato, Benchaaban, & Endo, 2002) and decreased transition time (Dettmer et al., 2000; Dooley et al., 2001; Massey & Wheeler, 2000).”
• Using Video-Enhanced Activity Schedules and Matrix Training to Teach Sociodramatic Play to a Child with Autism (2004, background): “Activity schedules are flexible teaching tools that have been used to address many skill deficits (Bryan & Gast, 2000; Massey & Wheeler, 2000; Pierce & Schreibman, 1994), including learning how to play independently and how to use emerging social and communication skills (Krantz & McClannahan,…”
• Increasing play and decreasing the challenging behavior of children with autism during recess with activity schedules and task correspondence training (2009, result): “These findings are consistent with past research demonstrating that teaching children with autism to use activity schedules can increase task engagement and play correspondence behavior, and decrease challenging behavior (Massey & Wheeler, 2000; Morrison et al., 2002; Pierce & Schreibman, 1994).”
• The Impact of Social Scripts and Visual Cues on Verbal Communication in Three Children With Autism Spectrum Disorders (2008, unknown): “…of using visual schedules to improve behavior problems (Dooley, Wilczenski, & Torem, 2001), task completion (Bryan & Gast, 2000; Dettmer, Simpson, Myles, & Ganz, 2000; MacDuff, Krantz, & McClannahan, 1993; Massey & Wheeler, 2000), and play skills (Morrison, Sainato, BenChaaban, & Endo, 2002).”
• Research on Self-Management Techniques Used by Students with Disabilities in General Education Settings: A Promise Fulfilled? (2006, unknown): “JAASEP, SUMMER, 2006 EDITION 40 We adapted McDougall s (1998) framework to report descriptive data in Table 1 and findings about procedural and outcome variables in Table 2.”
• Enhancing Social and Transition Behaviors of Persons with Autism through Activity Schedules: A Review (2008, unknown): “Researchers in several studies focused on interventions addressing transitions, particularly on-schedule and on-task behaviors and decreasing tantrums (Bryan & Gast, 2000; Dettmer et al., 2000; Dooley et al., 2001; Schmitt et al., 2000; Massey & Wheeler, 2000).”