Demetria Ennis-Cole

The Impact of Culture on Autism Diagnosis and Treatment: Considerations for Counselors and Other Professionals

This article explores the impact of culture on families’ perceptions of autism diagnosis and treatment. Competencies for counselors and other professionals that address the needs of children with autism and their families are presented. Therapeutic interventions, applications of technology, and strategies for responsive family-centered care and advocacy are highlighted.

TEACHING, TECHNOLOGY, AND SUPPORT IN THE NEW MILLENNIUM: A GUIDE FOR NEW COMMUNITY COLLEGE TEACHERS

Beginning community college faculties have many responsibilities associated with teaching. Technology can alter and enhance some of the traditional expectations for teaching and learning. New professionals will benefit by becoming familiar with existing and new technology and by recognizing the college mechanisms and support systems available to them including mentors, faculty, and staff.

EMPOWERING COUNSELORS TO WORK WITH SENIOR ADULT CLIENTS IN THE COMPUTER AGE

It is critical that counselors link their gerontological knowledge with that of various information technologies. Not only must counselors understand themselves as they work with diverse clients, they must also stay abreast of current information as it pertains to senior adults. This serves to expand and enhance the use of vital resources applicable to this client population. Staying abreast of available information and technologies and their uses with senior adults allows the counseling profession to mind its mission of service. This article addresses considerations that are essential as counselors prepare themselves to work effectively with senior adult clients in the computer age. Ten helpful Internet sites for counselors working with this group are also highlighted.

Copyright Laws and Fair Use in the Digital Era: Implications for Distance-Education Programs in Community Colleges

Practical information on the necessity for community colleges, instructors, and students to understand and abide by the copyright laws is essential. Whether developing, structuring, maintaining, or presenting courses, or instructing students on the development of their own papers, one must be knowledgeable about plagiarism, the Fair Use Act, and the Technology, Education, and Copyright Harmonization Act. Violations of the copyright laws can result in legal fees, awarding of compensation, loss of a position, and prison time.

Technologies to Facilitate Communication, Social Skill Development, Diagnostic Reporting, and Learning

This chapter describes ways computerized tools are used to teach a variety of functional, social, and communicative skills. Video-modeling, Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC) Devices, Robotics, Virtual Reality, Telepractice & Teletherapy, and Video Games will be discussed. Findings from the literature on these forms of technology, their uses, limitations, and applications will be discussed in order to explain their benefits in ASD. A variety of different forms of technology have been applied to the problems faced by learners with ASD, and six of these will be discussed. Several of these can be considered assistive-technologies, because they can be used to help a learner access an instructional environment, its resources, and its curriculum. In addition, technology tools can provide organizational support, present instruction visually, aid communication, provide a consistent presentation with fewer distractions, provide immediate feedback and structure, promote positive behavior, and create opportunities for social interaction.

Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) and Technology

This chapter describes some of the theories behind ASD, explains some of the characteristics of learners with ASD, explores different forms of technology that can be used to support individuals with ASD, and includes helpful tips for parents, teachers, and other individuals working with children with ASD. Technology tools can be beneficial for developing communication and social skills, demonstrating and rewarding appropriate behavior, and delivering multi-modal (auditory, visual, and tactile presentations) instruction. The portability, user control, immediate feedback, and teacher support make technology tools broadly applicable to a variety of instructional challenges. Students with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) can learn; they function at their best when they have patient and knowledgeable instructors who understand their learning needs, make connections between instructional content, facilitate practice, provide frequent reviews, present information in different ways, structure the learning environment, provide accommodations where needed, motivate the learner using some of his or her preferences, apply built-in reward mechanisms, and encourage success.

Strategies for Supporting Students with ASD

Students with ASD face many challenges; they are often misunderstood, fearful, anxious, and frustrated by circumstances beyond their control. This chapter describes strategies for supporting these individuals by recognizing problems they may have and helping them cope with an unpredictable environment and changing demands. This chapter was written for educators, parents/caregivers, and other professionals. Hopefully, it will create a dialogue which helps us better understand and more effectively work with individuals in the spectrum.

Family Issues in ASD

Parents of children with ASD face many struggles. They have a very short learning curve, and they must be consistent, provide an incredible amount of advocacy and support to their child with ASD, balance the needs of the child with ASD with the needs of their other children, manage their career and their home life, select evidence-based interventions, conduct research to find the most effective educational programs, finance therapeutic interventions, learn to deal with the everyday challenges of ASD, find time for their spouse, their friendships, and other familial ties, and somehow find time for respite. A diagnosis of ASD presents the family with a lifetime of challenges; life is never ordinary and routine occurrences (shopping, visiting friends, exploring a different route by car) can become very difficult. This chapter discusses some of the needs and issues of parents of children with ASD, describes ways technology provides assistance, and offers cautions for the use of technology in the home.

Technology-Created Visual Support

Individuals with ASD tend to be visual thinkers and learners; they gain clarity and understand content when it is presented visually. This chapter presents different types of charts, graphs, and graphic organizers that can be used to help students with ASD understand and review content material. Charts can be used to teach the vocabulary needed in the content areas; charts can present a visual representation that illustrates and decomposes instructional material so that it is easily understood. The visuals presented can serve as both an introduction to new concepts and a mechanism for bringing information from long term memory to working memory. The visual examples discussed below have been used with learners with ASD, and they have changed students’ attitudes toward the content—users who previously thought the content was too hard or boring expressed more of an understanding of the material, and even enjoyment after using these types of visuals. Students can gain prerequisite knowledge and build mental models of complex concepts by using these visual items. Applications software for word processing, spreadsheets, online comic strips and puzzles, and presentations is common place in most schools and homes, and that software can be used to build simple, but powerful learning tools.

The Need for Support, Learning Environments, and Technology Use

Children with ASD have to overcome more problems than most of their neurotypical peers; they struggle with sensory issues, communication, social skills deficits, and challenging behavior. Ordinary environments can become overwhelming or painful because of a hypersensitive or hyposensitive sensory system. The information most people filter effortlessly becomes an overload, and many times this leads to anxiety, stress, and frustration. Coping with any environment can be difficult, and instructional environments can be especially challenging because of the demands that are placed on the learner. In order to help a learner with ASD achieve and thrive in an instructional setting, knowledgeable teachers, support systems for communication, positive social interaction, and a structured learning environment are needed. Stimulus overselectivity, cognitive inflexibility, stereotypical behaviors, communication difficulties, a lack of academic motivation, the inability to take the perspective of another, and social skills deficits are challenges reviewed in this chapter. Support for these areas must be provided for success in an instructional environment. In addition, the instructional setting must be learner-centered, flexible, accommodating, and created using the following best practices for effective educational practice: individualized support, services for families, systematic instruction, family involvement, and other components discussed in the literature (Iovannone et al. 2003).