Effectiveness of discrete trial teaching training program for parents of children with autism spectrum disorder

Children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) are known to present lower performances on language and communication, self-care and academic skills compared to their normally growing counterparts. Education is the most effective factor for progress in problematic skill areas of children with ASD. Educational activities developed for children with ASD must be evidence based. Research groups, non-governmental organizations and institutions conduct studies and publish evidence based recommended practices and methodologies lists for employing in education of children with ASD. Discrete Trial Teaching (DTT) is one of the top-list evidence based methodologies taking place in all of these lists.Most of the evidence-based practices are limited to academic studies and there are numerous problems transferring these activities into educational institutions and homes, which are natural environments for children with ASD. Furthermore, Turkey can offer very little educational opportunities for children with ASD and these children?s educational opportunities depend on individual efforts and economic states of their families. Parental involvement is very important in overcoming problems and achieving desired outcomes in educational activities for children with ASD. DTT employment can be taught to various audiences including parents, undergraduates, teachers and paraprofessionals through instructional programs. It is known that parents can learn and utilize DTT while working with their children.viCurrent study investigated the effectiveness of a Discrete Trial Teaching Education Program (DTTEP), developed for parents, through a pre-test post-test control group design. Study was conducted with 28 parents and 14 children with ASD, which were equally divided into experimental and control groups (7 children and 14 parents in experimental group / 7 children and 14 parents in control group). DTTEP consists of 8 modules and constitutes the independent variable of the study. DTTEP can present the subject matter within text, video, video feedback and role-playing activity formats. DTTEP was presented to parents within 8 sessions taken place in Anadolu University Faculty of Education?s Special Education Practice Unit over 4 week period. Parents? DTT presentation performances, which were one of the dependent variables of the study, were measured using DTT Evaluation Form prior to and after the study. Another dependent variable of the study was children?s receptive language skills and it was measured by using Turkish Early Language Development Test (TELDT). The last dependent variable of the study was children?s imitation skills and it was measured using Imitation Skills Evaluation Form (ISEF). Researcher was able to find high trustworthiness evidences for dependent and independent variables. Furthermore a parental satisfaction form was developed and administered to participant parents for examining social validity of the study. Results showed that participant parents were satisfied with aims, procedures and results of the study. Collected quantitative data were analyzed using Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) Software. Among employed statistical analysis are ttest, ANOVA, Mann-Whitney U and Wilcoxon Tests.Comparison of pre-test and post-test scores of participant parents suggests that participant parents taken the DTTEP intervention (experimental group) performed significantly better than the control group in terms of presenting DTT to their children. Furthermore there were no significant gender differences in DTT presentation skills acquisition within experimental group. While literature suggests that fathers are more passive compared to mothers, this finding implies that fathers can perform as well as mothers when convenient educational opportunities supplied. Moreover follow up examinations revealed that parents who had taken the DTTEP intervention were continued to present DTT to their children after the study. Regarding children performances, there were no significant differences in imitation and language skills development for experimental and control groups. This finding was attributed to limited intervention time of the study (1 month). However, imitation skills scores of the experimental group children were differed from pre-test to posttest. Since there is a linear relationship between these skills, development in imitation skills viimay reflect upon the language development within long-term. Participant parents expressed that the study supported their children?s receptive language skills and imitation skills and they have continued to study with their children with DTT. Current study was able to teach DTT skills to parents and there were positive outcomes when these skills were employed while working with children with ASD.Keywords: Autism spectrum disorders, parent trainig, family education, discrete trial teaching, father, mother, receptive language, imitation