Preliminary investigation on multi-modal approach for teaching social interaction skills to autistic children

Autism which is a lifelong neurobiological disorder that blocks a child’s communication, emotional and social development is on the rise in Malaysia with 30% increase being reported in Malaysia from 2008-2011. Characteristics often associated with autism include quality impairment in social interactions such as eye-to-eye gaze, facial expression, body postures or lack of social or emotional reciprocity quality impairment in communication such as delay of development of spoken language or repetitive use of language and restricted repetitive and stereotyped patterns of behaviour, interest and activities. Due to this, an early childhood intervention is essential in ensuring autistic children have the opportunity to develop their full potential and to contribute to society in later years. The intervention will also enhance education opportunities of such children, thus supporting the efforts of NASOM as well as the government’s “education for all aspirations”. One approach that has shown great potential in enhancing social interaction skills among autistic children is the multi-modal mind games approach. The purpose of this study is to present a result on needs analysis that have been conducted at one training institute in Pahang to determine weaknesses and strengths of the current practices in developing social interaction skills among autistic children. Parents, teachers and students were interviewed to get a comprehensive view of the existing situation. The findings indicate that the use and ownerships of smart devices are prevalent and development of multi-modal communication application for enhancing social interaction skills of autistic children is feasable