Louise Southern

1. Promoting selective attention during instruction in high school students with high-functioning autism Louise Southern

2. Welcome secondary level educators! • In this tutorial, you will first receive a brief overview on the characteristics of • students with high-functioning autism (HFA) . • You will also learn about selective attention as a critical component to • learning. • Then, you will learn how and why these students with autism often struggle to • selectively attend during classroom instruction. • Finally, you will learn about the strategies and accommodations you might • arrange to help these students selectively attend during instructional periods. • Proceed to table of contents

3. Table of contents (Click on the puzzle piece to take you to that section) What is high-functioning autism? What is selective attention? How does autism impact selective attention?Strategies to promote attention The goal of this tutorial is to help you fit these four “pieces” together. *Click here for suggestions on how to navigate through this tutorial.

4. Section 1 What is high-functioning autism? • Autism overview • Relevance to regular education teachers • Review activity

5. Before you learn about high-functioning autism, you first need to know, what is autism? Autism is a developmental disability that causes deficits in three areas: Communication Socialization Behavior

6. Many individuals with autism also display significant learning problems. Click here for more information about the general characteristics of autism.

7. How does autism impact a student’s learning in the classroom? Surface issues: Poor self-monitoring Struggle to organize ideas Over-focus on topics, stimuli Difficulty following instructions Failure to recover from inattention Can’t discern relevant from irrelevant info Underlying issues: Poor auditory processing Executive dysfunction Hyper or hypo-stimulation to sensory input Impaired receptive and expressive communication skills Weak central coherence; seeing the “big picture” (Baron-Cohen, 1997)

8. Autism is a spectrum disorder This means that while each person with autism displays deficits in the areas of communication, socialization, and behavior, these deficits can range from mild to severe. Severe Moderate Mild ___________________________________________________________

9. Who are students with high-functioning autism? They display communication, socialization, behavioral, and learning deficits that are milderthan those of individuals who fall in the moderate to severe range on the autism spectrum. Yet, the reality is that these students with HFA still require ongoing support in order to perform successfully from an academic, social, and behavioral standpoint. For more info on HFA, click here.

10. If you are a regular educator working at the secondary level, why do you need to know about students with high-functioning autism? There are many reasons, but here are just three…

11. Reason # 1: It is estimated that 1 in 110 children in the U.S. have autism (Centers for Disease Control, 2006).

12. Reason # 2 Many students with high-functioning autism participate in the Standard Course of Study and seek a regular diploma.

13. Reason # 3: Most students with high-functioning autism spend the majority of their school day in the regular education setting.

14. Key point… If you are a regular education teacher working at the secondary level, it is likely that you will be responsible for delivering instruction in a content area to students with high-functioning autism.

15. Let’s do a quick review True or False? 1. Everyone with autism is affected to the same level of severity. 2. A student with autism usually displays deficits in the areas of communication, socialization, and behavior. 3. Many students with autism have significant learning problems. 4. Most students with high-functioning autism at the high school level spend the majority of their day in the special education classroom.

16. 1. Everyone with autism is affected to the same level of severity. FALSE - Autism is a spectrum disorder. This means that one person with autism might display mild symptoms and be characterized as “high-functioning” while another person might display severe symptoms. 2. A student with autism usually displays deficits in the areas of communication, socialization, and behavior. TRUE 3. Many students with autism have significant learning problems. TRUE 4. Most students with high-functioning autism at the high school level spend the majority of their day in the special education classroom. FALSE - Most students with high-functioning autism at the high school level spend the majority of their day in the regular education setting.

17. Now that you have a brief overview of high-functioning autism, let’s move on to the concept of selective attention.

18. Section 2 What is selective attention? • The fundamentals of attention • Definition of selective attention • Review activity

19. What is selective attention? To introduce you to this concept, let’s do a quick activity…. Watch this video for 2-3 minutes. As you watch, imaginethat you are a high school student in this classroom.

20. Think about it….. If you were a student in this classroom, what did you need to do in order to pay attention to the targeted content?

21. You need to focus visually on the content on the board, the teacher’s modeling, etc. You need to listen to questions, instructions, and comments.

22. To pay attention, you just needed to look and listen, right? No, there is much more to it than that….

23. You also need to link the concepts that the teacher was targeting to your background knowledge about basic algebra. You need to have automatized pre-algebra skills.

24. You need to quickly disengage from partner work and shift back to focus on the teacher. You need to monitor your own comprehension of and engagement in the task.

25. You need to mentally manipulate the information in order to hold it in working memory, and then effectively encode it in long term memory.

26. Now consider this question: What could have interfered with your attention to the targeted content?

27. Here are several factors that might interfere with your attention: Environmental distractions Low motivation levels Social distractions

28. Additional factors that might interfere with attention: • Limited prior knowledge • Un-automatized foundational skills • Unclear or inadequate information

29. Do you see how attention is not the simple act of looking or listening? Attention is a complex and multi-faceted cognitive process.

30. Attention is vital to learning! In order to learn, attention must be targeted specifically towards the task at hand. In other words, attention must be selective.

31. Selective attention is the strategic allocation of cognitive resources to the learning task at hand (Bruning, Schraw, & Norby, 2011). Students are required to learn so much in the classroom, so they need to be able to strategically allocate their attention (mental “fuel”) to the targeted content.

32. Skilled learners know how and when to allocate the right amount of attention to a learning task. If we think about selective attention as the mental “fuel” for learning, what will keep a student’s engine running on a full tank in the classroom context? What depletes their mental fuel?

33. In order to answer those questions about “fuel” levels, it is important for you to understand that a student’s selective attention is highly sensitive to the type of task being performed (Norman & Bobrow, 1976). There are two task types: Resource-limited tasks Data-limited tasks

34. Resource-limited tasks: Our cognitive resources are limited. We cannot attend to multiple, demanding tasks at the same time. A student can often improve their performance in resource-limited tasks if they shift more “mental fuel” (selectively attend) to the task.

35. What are examples of resource-limited tasks? • A student is trying to listen to the teacher while texting. He can shift more resources towards the learning task by turning off the phone. • A student is taking notes from the overhead while finishing homework due for the next class. She can shift more resources towards the learning task by putting her homework away. • A teacher observes that a student is distracted sitting next to certain peers. The teacher can assist the student in shifting more resources towards the learning task by moving the student to a new seat.

36. Data-limited tasks: Data-limited tasks are difficult because the student does not have enough information or knowledge (data) to perform the task. A student can usually not improve their performance in data-limited tasks if they simply shift more “mental fuel” (selectively attend) to the task.

37. What are examples of data-limited tasks? • A teacher is delivering a lesson on slope-intercept form. However, a student lacks the necessary background knowledge in pre-algebra in order to selectively attend to this new learning content because his cognitive resources are being divided between new material and efforts to gain background knowledge. • A teacher is writing notes on the board so that the students can get into groups to complete a learning task. However, a student cannot write quickly enough to take down essential information. He does not have the necessary information (data) to selectively attend to the learning task. • A student is reading a chapter in her Earth Science textbook. However, her decoding skills are not fully automatized, and this impacts her ability to selectively attend to the learning task (text comprehension).

38. So, how are data-limited tasks different from resource-limited tasks?

39. Answer: When a student allocates more attention (“fuel”) to a resource-limited task, their performance will probably improve because they have shifted needed resources to the task. However, when a student allocates more attention (“fuel”) to a data- limited task, their performance will probably not improve because they do not have adequate information or knowledge to perform the task. (This does not mean that there are not ways to address these issues…more on this later)

40. Let’s do a quick review True or false? • Selective attention is a basic mental process that involves looking and listening. • Selective attention is vital to learning. • The way in which a student selectively attends is highly dependent on the type of task.

41. Selective attention is a basic mental process that involves looking and listening. FALSE - Selective attention is a complex process that involves the strategic allocation of cognitive resources to the learning task. • Selective attention is vital to learning. TRUE 3. The way in which a student selectively attends is highly dependent on the type of task. TRUE

42. Key point… Selective attention “fuels” learning, and it involves the targeted allocation of cognitive resources to the specific learning task.

43. Now that you have learned about the concept of selective attention, let’s briefly explore how autism might impact a student’s ability to selectively attend in the classroom context.

44. Section 3 How does autism impact selective attention in the classroom setting? • Knowing whento selectively attend • Knowing why to selectively attend • Knowing how to selectively attend • Review activity

45. First of all, it is important to remember that selective attention is the strategic allocation of cognitive resources to the learning task. In order to selectively attend in the classroom context, students must first be able to recognize when a teacher is delivering the most important or relevant instructional content.

46. This means that students need to be able to recognize and respond to the obvious signs, and the subtle signs, that you use to cue their selective attention.

47. The cues you might provide come in many forms. Here are a few examples: • Direct verbal cues (“Ok, this is important”) • Indirect verbal cues (“You might see this again somewhere….”) • Printed handouts, study guides, graphic organizers containing key concepts • Underlining, highlighting, bolding, circling important items • Repeating the same type of problems or concepts to emphasize importance • Visual demonstrations (modeling, videos, images) • Verbally summarizing key points at the end of class • Written information on the board, overhead • Verbally enunciating certain words or phrases • Verbal cues to direct attention to peer’s ideas, comments (“Did you hear what he just said?”) • Non-verbal signals (e.g. pointing, visually referencing)

48. But many of your students with autism might miss these cues. Why?

49. Communication is one of the core areas of deficit in most individuals with autism. Communication refers not only to the sharing of information (expressive communication), but also to the receiving of information (receptive communication).

50. A student with communication problems might miss a teacher’s cues to selectively attend during instruction because they struggle to: • Follow verbal, multi-step directions • Accurately interpret tone of voice (indicating sarcasm, emphasis, importance) • Accurately interpret puns, metaphors, idioms • Respond to non-verbal cues (gestures) that signal attention • Quickly shift attention to various speakers (peers) • Discriminate speech sounds • Consistently express the need for clarification or assistance