Virtual Learning for People with ASD (VL4ASD)

By: Dr. Yurgos Politis14th March 2016

ASSISTID Overview

• The ASSISTID programme will fund 40 post-doctoral fellows

• It is co-funded by the European Commission and the charity RESPECT, and is coordinated by the DOCTRID Research Institute.

• DOCTRID includes the Daughters of Charity Disability, all of the universities on the island of Ireland, the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland, and MSU & UM in the US

ASSISTID Overview (cont.)

The ASSISTID programme will equip postdoctoral researchers with multidisciplinary skills to enable them assume leadership roles in intellectual disability research and with the Services which provide for the education, social inclusion and employment of people with autism or an intellectual disability.

Inclusive Learning Project Overview

Funded under the Leonardo da Vinci (LdV) Sectoral Programme of the Lifelong Learning Programme (Contract No: 2012-1-ES1-LEO05-49449)

The consortium: University of Girona (UdG)Open University of Catalonia (UOC)University of Piraeus Research Centre (UPRC) University College Dublin (UCD) Raising the Floor International (RtF-I).Plus silent partners from Latin American HEIs

Main aim: providing accessibility guidelines including pedagogical methodologies to address learning needs of people with disabilities in a learning process.

Key element of the Inclusive Learning Portal architecture is the Inclusive Learning Handbook, which provides an easy guide for teachers on how to develop accessible LOs.

Handbook Content

1. Historical context of Inclusive education 2. Definitions, 3. Main principles for inclusive e-learning 4. Learning management tools that will be utilised. 5. Examples (useful tips on how to design web content that allows anyone to perceive, understand, navigate and interact with that content)6. Use cases (contains learning scenarios, which is a space for reflection for educators)

Project Proposal

• “Disability” can be seen as a mismatch between the needs of the learner and the learning environment.

• An education-specific definition: “ (disability) is a mismatch between a learner’s needs and the education offered” (IMS, 2004).• Behaviour Analysis is increasingly being applied to

general and special education; • Behavioural Analysis has increasingly been

recognised as the basis for necessary intervention and educational provision for individuals with ASD.

• Applied Behaviour Analysis (ABA) is the application of this science to enhance or develop socially relevant behaviours (e.g. communication and language skills, social skills, reading and other academic and life skills).

• Increase in awareness of ASD has resulted in the need for training in diagnosis, early intervention, educational provision and support services.

What are 3D Virtual Worlds?

Immersive 3D spaces delivered over the Internet to a standard PC

User represented by an avatar – which can look like whatever they want

Talk with other users by voice or text chat, in public or in private

Multiple user environment

Bespoke environments to achieve goals

Embedded training and learning exercises

Monitor & plan all activity from the web

Multimedia rich 3D social media

• 3D Virtual Worlds can offer users a sense of co-presence and realism (Childs, 2010; Yee et al. 2009)

• VWs also provide an increased sense of control, allowing participants to more readily engage with their in-world experiences (de Freitas et al., 2010).

• Moreover, VWs can offer opportunities for social interaction, especially in the classroom.

• For example, the basic text-chat systems employed by most VWs make conversations easy, structured and inclusive of users who might find ‘real world’ social communication a challenge (Newbutt, 2014).

Improve quality

• Meet needs

• Motivational

• Flexible life-like contexts for learning and work• Personalise and support independent learning• Enable teachable moments in a safe space

• Engaging & non threatening• Visual, immersive & multi-media • Anonymous intimacy

• Shared sense of presence & place • Multi-modal, inclusive & accessible • Saves time, money & emissions

Affordances of VR

SMART E-Healthbook 3D Context

Individual Education Plan (IEP)

• Internationally accepted

• Underpinned by law in many countries

What is an IEP– a written plan for a particular pupil that addresses specific

needs,

– developed through a collaborative process involving the school, parents, pupil and other professionals

– a record of adapted or modified aspects of the educational programme

– a focus on the priority learning needs of the pupil

– Areas of identified need arising from assessment should be included

– Amount of adaptation and support will vary from pupil to pupil

– An IEP is an ongoing ‘living process’ rather than a finished product

Stages in the IEP Process - review as appropriate

referral if appropriate

assessment

gathering informationwriting the IEP

implementing theIEP

review the plan

The IEP Process

• This proposed project will devise ways to enhance the learning experience of secondary school students with ASD, including the creation of Individual Educational Plans (IEPs) through a Virtual Learning Evironment.

• Research has shown that 3D virtual environments (VEs) can offer their users collaborative learning experiences, and have been shown to yield significant benefits in terms of skills development, improved attitudes and motivation (Bouta & Retalis, 2012).

• The Fellow will study the frameworks carefully and will adapt the development of the IEPs accordingly to meet the needs of the users.

• The main research question of this project is: How can we best measure the effectiveness of teaching students with ASD academic, social and other skills through the use of a Virtual World (VW)?• The research plan will include gathering of an

evidence-base to establish an Impact Evaluation metric: to include studying the effects of creating IEPs for students with ASD (increased sense of control, social interaction, realism);

• The research will also seek to identify possible social, cultural and economic factors that may influence the outcomes in Ireland and the US.

Project Objectives:• To undertake training on ABA techniques and

methods, primarily at MSU (the Department of Counselling, Educational Psychology and Special Education) for cross-cultural comparison.

• Training on working with and developing VWs (Hao2 – which specialises on providing training for individuals with ASD - and SMARTlab – which specialises in the use of VWs as assistive technologies for people with disabilities).

Project Objectives (cont.):• Familiarisation with policies on Special Education, in

both the Irish and American contexts;• Development of IEPs with secondary school students

who have been diagnosed with ASD.• Assessment of results/ Impact Analysis.

Case study• Quantitative research design;• Participants will be selected from Peckham Inc. (US)

and the Daughters of Charity (DoC) in Ireland. .• A single case design is seen as the most appropriate

methodology for this project.• Thus, the assessment will be carried out on an

individual basis, comparing the results prior and after the intervention

• Data analysis will be carried out through SPSS or similar statistical package.

Virtual World Element

• Hao2 (www.hao2.eu)is providing training on the UNITY, OPENSIM and TERF platforms.

• Hao2.eu is a social firm promoting the use of the latest in creative and digital technologies for inclusive innovation

• Since early 2010, they have been researching the potential and applications of 3D virtual world technologies.

• Hao2 in partnership with Beacon Education Partnership have developed Virtual World, that I have been given access to.

• I will customize this VW with a scenario on teaching social skills to teens with ASD, with the help of Hao2 tech team

• The scenario could be tested with people linked to hao2 who are on the spectrum

Measurement Tools• I will use the Perceived Empathic Self-Efficacy Scale (PESE)

and the Perceived Social Self-Efficacy Scale (PSSE), which were developed to assess, respectively, individuals’ self-efficacy beliefs regarding both empathic responding to others’ needs or feelings and managing interpersonal relationships. I will also use in combination with the above, the Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD) Scale.

• The measure will comprise of 5 PSSE , 6 PESE and 7 GAD items.

• The measure will be filled in pre and post intervention with the sample group.

Sample size: 15 students in the USA + 15 students in Ireland (the Republic)= 30 total.Sample characteristics: Moderate ASD & co-morbid ASD/ID (50:50)Age group: 15-18 year-olds-teaching this group academic, social and other skills through the use of a Virtual World might increase their success in the transition from school to independence.

• Inclusion Criteria15-18 year-olds50% Moderate Autism, 50% co-morbid (autism and other Intellectual Disability –ID)School leavers/home-schooled• Exclusion CriteriaSevere AutismPeople with epilepsyPeople with disruptive behavioursPeople with severe hearing impairmentPeople with severe visual impairmentPeople with low reading skills

Overview of fellows’ career development plan

Necessary Training• Training on ABA will be provided by MSU:CEP 844: Applied Behaviour Analysis ICEP 845: ASD - Assessment and InterventionCEP 846: ASD - Advanced TopicsCEP 854: ABA II - Ethical Conduct for the Behaviour Analyst

• Training on Virtual Worlds will be provided by HaO2;3DNovations 3D Cloud services training at all 3 levels 1. Level1 Basic user, 2. Level 2 Expert User (support other Basic users)3. Super Admin User (sets up all the accounts and

manages the backend and data)30 hours training required (mostly online)