Inclusion of an Autistic Child in Kindergarten Facility: A Case Study

Abstract

This study aimed to investigate the effects of inclusion of an autistic child, at entrance age of four years and seven months, into the Child Care Center of the Sultan Qaboos University. The study was designed to specifically answer: (1) Which domains of the ASDA scale did „Ahmad‟ show notable improvement? (2) Which areas of the academic program did „Ahmad‟ show notable improvement? The program at the Center is a bilingual mainstream program in Arabic and English. It is a highly structured and individualized program which covers all of the developmental domains. It caters for two groups of mixed age children from a variety of ethnic backgrounds. The study used the Arabic Scale for Detecting Autism – ASDA (Al Qaryouti & Ababneh, 2006) along with an entrance test and parent interview. The result of this assessment indicated that the subject of this study had autism. After six months, a further application of the scale showed that significant improvement had occurred, particularly in the communication and social interaction domains. Concurrently, the subject made marked progress in his academic studies, notably in the areas of math and language. A further application of the scale a year after the second indicated that the lack of severity of symptoms no longer warranted the autistic label. Inclusion of autistic children in a normal setting can have a positive impact on both social behavior and academic skills, if a well-structured program and a controlled learning environment in the setting of adequately training teachersis applied.