The effect of extracurricular activities on social participation of children on the autism spectrum

This case study examines the effect of guided participation strategies usee by coaches on the social participation of children with autism in an inclusive sports program. A steady increase was observed in the children's social participation. The results showed that 7 specific guided participation strategies used by the coaches were particularly effective for increasing social participation for the children. These findings support the importance of contextualized intervention, and suggest that SLPs can play a valuable role as a collaborator with education professionals to systematically scaffold speech, language, and social communication within whole, purposeful and complex activity/context.