Research into Practice

For this assignment, I found an article called “Teaching Conversational Skills to Children

with Autism: Effect on the Development of a Theory of Mind.” I found this article using the

McKay library research search engine. This research study assessed whether children with

autism could be taught to improve their conversational skills. The children in this study were

taught how to start a conversation, take turns during conversation, listen attentively, stay on topic

in conversation, and then appropriately change a conversational topic. The strategies employed

in order to help these children improve their conversational skills proved to be effective. The

participants in the study showed an improvement in their ability to maintain a conversation topic

and the length of their answers increased, as well.

I believe the research in this study was valid because this research was backed by other

research, as well. The article highlighted other studies that have come to similar conclusions, as

well. When looking at the “Evaluating Research Criteria” document, this research article meets

most of this criterion. The article is well written with the purpose stated and the research process

is written in a logical manner. Clear explanations are given of how each conversational skill was

taught to the children. My one hesitation with this article is that only three students were

included in the study. In order to improve the validity of this research, more students would need

to be tested. The researchers additionally pointed out that there were some limitations to this

study. They mention that the improvements the participants made in the study might not be

solely because of their interventions. Additionally, they stated that the interventions only lasted

nine sessions, regardless of what progress the participants had made.

Based on this article, we chose to implement the strategy to help maintain a conversation

topic. We’ve noticed that Peter has difficulty staying on topic in conversation. Frequently, when
we are discussing a topic with him he will randomly bring up something unrelated to the

conversation. It is then difficult to redirect his attention back to the original topic of

conversation.

In order to implement this strategy, we first did an activity to help Peter identify what

staying on topic in a conversation looks like. We chose to do this activity on the topic of

bowling because Peter has mentioned many times that he likes to bowl. We created individual

sentences on slips of paper. Some of the sentences we created related to bowling and some did

not. We then had Peter identify which sentences were related to the topic of bowling and which

were not. For the next activity, we had slips of paper that had a topic of conversation on them.

We explained to Peter that he was going to pick out a slip of paper and read the topic that is listed

on the paper. Then, we would have a conversation about that topic for two minutes. The article

gave some steps that I liked that we recited to Peter: 1. Listen carefully 2. Think about what the

person says 3. Talk about the same thing.

Overall, Peter seemed to respond well to this activity. He was able to successfully

identify topics of conversation that were on and off topic from the topic of bowling. The task

where we had him stay on topic with us for two minutes proved to be more difficult. With verbal

prompting however, he was able to be redirected back to the original topic of conversation.

Overall, I liked this strategy and thought it was effective. I liked that it allowed Peter to

really think about what qualifies staying on topic in conversation. I also liked the idea of giving

some examples of what staying on topic in a conversation does not look like. From

implementing this strategy, I was reminded of the importance of catering activities to the child’s

interests. We tried to pick conversation topics that we knew Peter liked and this seemed to help

him want to stay on topic during the conversations.

 Reference:

Hsiao Yun Chin, J. A., & Barnard-Opitz, V. (2000). Teaching Conversational Skills to Children

with Autism: Effect on the Development of a Theory of Mind. Journal of Autism &

Developmental Disorders, 30(6), 569. https://doi-

org.byui.idm.oclc.org/10.1023/A:1005639427185