School is challenging for students with autism because it requires a lot more than academic skills to be successful.
Behavioural and emotional management, and learning how to learn skills
are essential if they are going to learn anything effectively and efficiently.Social Communication Skill
are essential if they are going to learn anything effectively and efficiently.
Social and leisure skill
is the key to developing friendships and having an enjoyable school life.Besides, these skills are not learned incidentally by children with autism as they are by neurotypical children because of their difficulties in social communication and interaction, their restricted interest and their lack of motivation.
In AP School, we use the Autism Partnership Method to help our students who are diagnosed with autism to overcome these challenges and develop essential skills for school success. It is a unique style of using Applied Behaviour Analysis (ABA) which values making the lessons fun and natural, providing a high level of individualisation, making clinical judgments and working with the whole child.
Autism spectrum disorder is currently the fastest-growing developmental disorder. With the rapid increase in the number of students who are identified with autism, more teachers support students with autism in their classrooms now than ever. As the only primary school for students with autism in Hong Kong, it is our mission to promote effective teaching practices not only within our school but also in the field of autism education. We are committed to research about effective teaching practices, and present the findings in peer-review journals and conferences. For example, last year, we researched about teaching communication skills within academic lessons (Cheung, Lai, Cihon, Leaf & Mountjoy, 2020). The result showed that all of the participants acquired the individualized communicative responses as well as the academic targets.
AP Schools’ publications include: