Teaching pupils with autism : listening to teachers' stories

Abstract

This study intended to explore the experiences of primary school teachers teaching pupils with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) in the inclusive primary school classroom. The research question: “What are primary school teachers’ experiences of teaching pupils with autism?” warranted a qualitative research design using individual audio-taped interviews as the research tool and thematic analysis. Interviews were semi-structured and were informed from the literature review. The voices of the six participants are presented in themes and sub-themes. The findings reflect the literature and indicate that teaching children with ASD is not an easy task and presents challenges. Participants stressed that effective inclusive classrooms promote a better education for children with a profile of ASD. Recommendations for implementation, policy and future research elicited from the data include a need for more training at the Initial Teacher Training level, a need for opportunities to build teamwork amongst professionals working in schools and organisation of courses, training sessions and peer-support sessions to share knowledge and techniques about the profile of ASD. Participants evidenced that they regard teaching as a vocational profession and teachers must do their best to leave a positive educational impact on each student. Their recommendations show that teachers should never give up on students even though profiles might be challenging. All in all, these findings indicate that inclusion of children with ASD is paramount to our education system.