Teachers' Interactions with a Young Child with: Comparing iPad and non-iPad Use

Abstract

The purpose of this study was investigating teachers’ interaction with a young child withASD when they were using iPad to support language and communication skills development.A case study method was applied. Business-as-usual classroom interaction wasanalyzed. Utterances were divided into two conditions (iPad-use and non-iPad-use) tocompare effectiveness on supporting the child’s engagement in teacher-child interaction.In addition, interviews with teachers were conducted to collect more information abouttheir own perspectives regarding iPad use with the student with ASD. Results of thestudy indicate that child-teacher joint attention and teachers’ verbal assistance happenedmore frequently when iPad was not used. In addition, surprisingly, teachers put a minoremphasis on iPad use for targeted instruction for language and communication skillsdevelopment, different from their initial claim. These findings suggest that more professionaldevelopment for teachers’ iPad use in language and communication skills developmentshould be provided.