Addressing Anxiety & Autism: RAI Classroom Story

Objective

Kristen Whoolery is a Speech Language Pathologist working with preschool to second-grade children. Ms. Whoolery wanted to address the anxiety and sensory overload often experienced by children with autism. Some of the students in her speech pathology program found it difficult to utter more than 3 to 10 words and needed support in areas such as sharing ideas, turn-taking, and topic maintenance. She decided to try Robot-Assisted Instruction (RAI) with the hope of helping these students become more open to expressing themselves and making connections with her and their fellow students.

Strategy

Ms. Whoolery works with children in group therapy sessions. These sessions typically lasted 30 minutes, with group sizes ranging from 3-5 children.

The strategy centered on implementing Robot-Assisted Instruction (RAI) into therapy sessions to:

  1. Reduce anxiety and sensory difficulties
    • A robot in the classroom is a student peer and doesn’t represent the same power dynamics as teachers and other adults do. This helps to reduce student anxiety.
    • A robot is also non-judgmental. It does not consider stimming and nonverbal communication distracting or problematic. This also helps reduce student anxiety.
    • The robot’s simple face and speech patterns reduce the amount of sensory processing for students with autism.
  2. Increase motivation and engagement in learning activities
    • Sharing information with a robot peer in a safe, low-anxiety environment can help students redirect energy normally spent processing and trying to adapt to directly engaging in activities.
  3. Facilitate the generalization of skills from therapy to real-life situations
    • The classroom robot is as patient as it is non-judgmental allowing children to experience the same circumstances and scenarios over and over until they are confident in using skills with teachers and fellow students.

Implementation & Creativity

Ms. Whoolery integrated RAI into her therapy sessions, employing a creative and multi-faceted approach:

  1. Diverse Lesson Topics: Various lessons were implemented, including:
    • Brushing teeth
    • Sharing ideas
    • Identifying and expressing emotions
    • Following directions
  2. Multi-Sensory Approach: Lessons were enhanced with props and hands-on activities. For example:
    • In the teeth-brushing lesson, students were provided with a pretend mouth, toothbrush, and cup to imitate the robot’s actions.
    • Students later used disposable oral swabs to practice brushing their own teeth.
  3. Social Skills Focus: The “sharing ideas” lesson taught students about turn-taking and staying on topic during conversations.
  4. Visual Supports: The robot provided visual cues to reinforce learning concepts.
  5. Generalization Activities: Skills learned with the robot were practiced in real-life scenarios, such as participating in classroom show-and-tell sessions.
  6. Supplementary Resources: RAI was complemented with YouTube videos and imitation exercises led by Ms. Whoolery, reinforcing the robot’s lessons.

This multi-modal approach addressed various learning styles and needs, making the therapy sessions more engaging and effective.

Results & Evaluation

The implementation of RAI in Ms. Whoolery’s speech therapy sessions for yielded significant positive outcomes:

  1. Improved Social Communication Skills:
    • Students demonstrated the ability to stay on topic and actively participate in show-and-tell activities.
    • They remained engaged while sharing ideas and refrained from interrupting others.
  2. Enhanced Engagement and Motivation:
    • Students demonstrated increased motivation to participate in therapy activities.
    • They completed lessons with minimal prompts, showing improved attention and engagement.
  3. Reduced Anxiety and Sensory Difficulties:
    • Children with anxiety appeared more relaxed during sessions with the robot.
    • Students who typically struggled with teeth brushing completed the activity without sensory difficulties.
  4. Improved Language Skills:
    • There was an overall increase in the level of communication among the students.
    • Improvements were noted in joint attention, turn-taking, patience, and following directions.
  5. Behavioral Improvements:
    • Students showed a reduction in disruptive behaviors during therapy sessions.
    • They demonstrated respect for the robot’s personal space, potentially generalizing to an improved understanding of social boundaries.
  6. Skill Maintenance and Generalization:
    • Students began to apply skills learned with the robot to real-life situations, such as classroom activities.
    • The multi-modal approach helped in maintaining acquired skills.

Most Compelling Finding

The most striking outcome of this case study is the robot’s ability to guide students through tasks they typically struggled with, leading to meaningful improvements in their communication and social skills.

“They see the robot as their friend [and] respect his personal space. They love to give the robot a hug goodbye and hello. It has been life-changing for me and I have really enjoyed seeing the robot’s interaction with the students and how it has changed their lives.”

The success of this implementation has encouraged Ms. Whoolery to continue integrating RAI into her therapy sessions. The positive outcomes observed, particularly in social communication, anxiety reduction, and skill generalization, provide a strong foundation for further exploration of RAI in speech and language interventions for children with autism.

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