Introduction

Allison is six years old and attends a general kindergarten class. For more than twenty-five
percent of the day, Allison receives one-to-one instruction in the resource room. She has been
diagnosed as falling on the Autism Spectrum. Allison is the only child of Wendy, a full-time
mother and freelance photographer, and Arthur, a pharmacist. It became clear that something
wasn't right shortly before Allison's third birthday. She appeared physically normal and major
motor milestones were achieved as expected. However, Allison's language development was
delayed and her cognitive development has been slower to emerge than her language skills. For
example, although she can hold simple conversations with peers and adults (language), she is
unable to identify similarities and differences between and among letters and numbers (important
cognitive skills of discrimination and generalization).

She has attended general preschool and kindergarten and has progressed in her peer relationships
and interactions. Because of teacher and parent concerns about Allison's language and cognitive
development, the school psychologist and resource room teacher initiated the prereferral process.

Present Levels of Educational Performance

The school psychologist for Allison's school administered the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for
Children III-Revised (WISC-IIIR), and the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test (PPVT). Both
measures indicated cognitive delays, and the PPVT results suggested that Allison, although able
to identify pictures appropriate for much younger children (truck, for example), could not
identify pictures that featured more abstract, or higher order, levels of representation (such as
fear or town). Allison struggles being able to identify human emotions and being able to read
social cues presented by her peers.

The resource teacher administered several criterion-referenced measures of mastery in the

curricular areas of reading and numbers. While she can identify primary and some secondary
colors, and she can identify basic shapes, she is unable to consistently recall both upper- and
lower-case letters and can only consistently identify numbers 1-5.

Perspectives from Allison's Family

According to Wendy and Arthur, Allison has never refused to develop social relationships with
other children; she just seems not to be aware of how to go about it. Although they are worried
about Allison's lack of academic progress, increasing her social abilities and relationships is their
top priority. They would like to see her formulate relationships with her peers in a deeper more
meaningful way.