Social communication deficits are one of the defining features of autism spectrum disorder. In schools, social communication deficits are assumed to be due to a skill acquisition issue and remediated through social skills instruction; however, social skills instruction has been fairly criticized, particularly by those in the autistic community, as…

In this Teaching Issues article, we make the case for using Integrated Performance Assessments (IPAs) to get a better picture of ELLs/MLLs learning progress and language development and thus, contributing to more equitable learning environments in both instruction and assessment practices. An Integrated Performance Assessment allows learners to…

Individual differences in children's social communication have been shown to mediate the relationship between poor vocabulary or grammar and behavioural difficulties. Moreover, there is increasing evidence that social communication skills predict difficulties with peers over and above vocabulary and grammar scores. The essential social…

Transformational leadership focuses on how leaders' personalities influence interactions with followers and it champions the power of quality personal interactions in creating a harmonious work environment to effect changes on school outcomes. In their daily interaction with followers, leaders perceive and respond to the surrounding reality; their…

Social communicative precursors to autism spectrum disorder may influence how infants who are later diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder interact with their social partners and the responses they receive, thus bidirectionally influencing early social experience. This systematic review aimed to identify a developmental timeline for parent-infant…

This commentary draws on the four articles in this issue to discuss interactional competence from a usage-based perspective. The usage-based conception of language knowledge as an inventory of form-meaning pairings used for communicative purposes will be qualified by incorporating the idea that these communicative purposes are social actions. L2…

This paper addresses educators' responsibility for the discourse (including their own and others') that circulates in educational settings. This issue tends to arise especially with hurtful language and other discursive acts that have negative effects, and that require an apology, correction, or some other kind of remedial discourse. The paper…

This paper argues for a broadening of the analytic scope of research on L2 interactional competence so as to embrace systematic investigation of the linguistic resources that L2 speakers put to use for the specific purpose of coordinating social interaction. The paper first offers a conceptualisation of interactional competence in terms of…

Commemorating the 40th anniversary of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM) III, the purpose of this commentary is to describe school-based and school-relevant interventions and instructional approaches for children and youth with autism that have been developed and employed during that time period. The commentary begins with a brief…

Senate Bill (SB) 163 would alter the current law that requires coverage of behavioral health treatment (BHT) for autistic spectrum disorder (ASD). SB 163 would expand the definition of BHT to include treatment modalities based on developmental theory, would make technical changes to definitions related to network adequacy, would prohibit denial of…

On average, people spend between 45% and 70% of their day listening to others (Johnson, 1996). Despite the frequency with which people engage in this activity, its importance in interpersonal interactions may go overlooked. Individuals can typically identify that listening is a valued communication skill (Bambacas & Patrickson, 2008; Papa,…

John Dewey's masterpiece "Democracy and Education", from 1916, is clearly far removed from the dominant tendencies of current education policy in the western world, with their emphasis on the narrow accountability of the New Public Management. Nevertheless, his book still challenges those tendencies and sets forth criteria for…

Responding to the increasing sophistication in the arts of deception in the public realm, the authors turn to Goodlad's ideal of democratic citizenship nurtured through human conversation in the classroom and development of critical skills to evaluate the accuracy of arguments.

The purpose of this article is to help early interventionists who work with families of toddlers showing early signs of autism think through the "what" and the "how" of early intervention for toddlers with social communication difficulties, even though the child has not yet been diagnosed. Questions include the following: (1)…

Anecdotal evidence shared by teachers appears to support the iPad as a useful tool for working with children with autism. However, there are thousands of possible applications, known as "apps", available in the Apple iTunes store for download and trying to decide what would be most useful for students can be daunting. This article will…