PROLECA: Programa de Leitura e Comunicação para crianças com Autismo

Abstract

The Autism has been a recurrent theme in scientific literature for decades. Studies from many fields of knowledgement, specially education and health, have realized empirics researches in order to investigate how to soften the peculiarities of the disorder by using the best clinics and/or educations practices. Besides, to present the hindrances about reading comprehension, joint attention, characters nomination and others behaviors have been a huge challenge for researchers and relatives who deal with autistic children. The scientific literature has shown the Reading to Engage Children with Autism in Language and Learning RECALL as a common learning practice based on strategies with empirical evidences to enable communication, reading and vocabulary of children with autism. The RECALL is an interventional program based on dialogic reading whose strategies led adults to ask evocative questions to the children, encouraging them to participate and dialog with the adults during the moment of telling a story. The present study proposes to investigate the applications effects of Reading and Communication for Children with Autism Program PROLECA, that consists of real techniques originated in dialogic reading from RECALL, in addition to storytelling, adapted by the author researcher in reading comprehension and communication skills of a child with autism and speech disorders. A five-year-old child with Autism and functional articulation disorders has participated in this study with the author researcher. A single-subject experimental design (SSED) of type A-B-A-B was performed using as independent variable the PROLECA and using as dependent variable the child responses about reading comprehension and communications. After the intervention procedure, the results showed that the children stayed longer in the task, as well as he conceded the jointed attention in ascending way with the author researcher. Besides, there were increasing correct spontaneous response, even though in a very peculiar way. The children responses were conceded by mix responses (vocalization + gesture). The use of PEED hierarchy, especially during the interventions, demonstrated that the children was more responsive when visual aids were offered to him. Also, the results demonstrated an increasing expressive vocabulary and 100% of fidelity in independent variable application. In conclusion, given the above procedures, more interventions investigations about reading comprehension in Autism children should be performed as well as the verifications of strategies effects of reading based on empirics evidences