Autistic children are less likely to be jointly engaged with a play partner than nonautistic children, negatively impacting social communication development. Promoting joint engagement during play can be an important target for educators of autistic students, but educator perceptions of autistic students may affect their interactions with…

This study examined the reliability and validity of the 13-item Classroom Observation Scale as used by teachers and non-clinically trained observers to identify children who more likely than their peers to have autism spectrum disorder in less-resourced preschools. A total of 534 children (ages 2;10 to 4;5, Mean = 3;8) from nine Chinese-language…

This mixed-methods study aimed to test the feasibility, acceptability, and fidelity of involving early childhood education (ECE) staff without special education training or prior parent coaching experience in the delivery of an adapted evidence-based parent coaching intervention for young children with autism (Focused Playtime…

Children begin to show preferences for specific playmates as early as the first 2?years of life. Children with autism spectrum disorder have difficulty making friends, even in elementary and middle school. However, very little is known about earlier friendships in children with autism such as preschool friendships. This study examined friendships…

Difficulty with social competence is a core deficit of autism spectrum disorder. Research on typically developing children and children with disabilities, in general, suggests the adult talk received in the classroom is related to their social development. The aims of this study were to examine (1) the types and amounts of adult talk children with…

Purpose: Early Achievements for Education Settings (EA-ES) is a teacher-implemented naturalistic developmental behavioral intervention for preschoolers with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) targeting core social communication impairments. The purpose of this pilot randomized controlled clinical trial (RCT) was to examine promise of efficacy of this…

This study examined the prevalence of ADHD symptoms and anxiety as reported by parents and teachers for 180 preschool children (ages 4-5) and school-aged children (ages 6-7) with ASD using the Child Behavior Checklist--Parent and Teacher Report Forms (Achenbach and Rescorla, Manual for ASEBA school-age forms & profiles, Research Center for…

Pivotal Response Training (PRT) is a naturalistic, behavioral intervention with a strong evidence-base that is designed to increase generalization and maintenance of responding in children with ASD. Although special education teachers report using PRT, little research to date has examined PRT use in the context of community school programs. There…

This study investigated questions adults asked to children with autism spectrum disorder in inclusive pre-kindergarten classrooms, and whether child (e.g. autism severity) and setting (i.e. adult-to-child ratio) characteristics were related to questions asked during center-time. Videos of verbal children with autism spectrum disorder (n?=?42) were…

Children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) tend to be less playful than their typically developing (TD) peers. Although playfulness is considered a personality characteristic, little is known about the stability of this trait in interactions with different caregivers. This study compared the playfulness of children with and without ASD in play…

This study describes the language environment of preschool programs serving children with autism spectrum disorders (ASDs) and examines relationships between child characteristics and an automated measure of adult and child language in the classroom. The Language Environment Analysis (LENA) system was used with 40 children with ASD to collect data…

The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of peer intervention on the social interactions of children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). In this model, a speech-language pathologist and three early childhood educators trained typically developing peers to engage children with ASD in play. Three preschool children with ASD and six…