Assessing the efficacy of two dialogic reading programs on comprehension in children with autism spectrum disorder and typical development

Abstract

Language and reading comprehension hurdles in children with typical development (TD), as well as those with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), can be minimized with early reading practices. Thus, the purpose of the present study was to analyze the effectiveness of two reading programs, the Reading to Engage Children with Autism in Language and Learning (RECALL) and Simple Dialogic Reading (SDR), implemented with 2 preschoolers with ASD and one with TD. A randomized experimental ABAB design was employed to assess the effects of the two programs on the frequency of correct responses to factual and inferential questions regarding the narrated stories, as well as on the vocabulary development of the three children. The results show that through autoscopic and modeling strategies, the 7 mediators, the children’s parents and health and education professionals, developed competencies to implement both protocols with an adequate degree of reliability. The three children learned new vocabulary when exposed to RECALL and SDR, without showing significant differences between the programs. On the other hand, when assessing the frequency of correct answers to the set of type of questions, it was observed that performance has significantly improved for all the three children with RECALL. When extending the analyses considering the value of the answers given based on the level of support, considerable differences were found solely for two of them. Contributions and limitations of the study are also discussed.