The strengths and limitations of the methodology and methods

In many ways, this was an extremely ambitious study which generated many forms of data over an academic year. The mixed-methods chosen for each phase were very powerful in aiding the participants and me to understand the factors which were important to the next stage of the work. The Phase 1 teacher survey and parent questionnaire provided the baseline data from which the Phase 2 training could be planned. The separate staff and parent discussions and activities at their respective training sessions enabled a deeper understanding of the barriers which needed to be overcome so that Phase 3 (the 12-week programme) was successful. The multimodal methods of communication and sharing (videos, meetings and diaries) which were used throughout Phase 3 enabled the development of strong and trusting partnerships between parents and teachers, joint problem-solving and facilitation of strategies which supported successful home-school reading. The interviews in Phase 4 showed that the work of the programme had indeed helped to tackle some of the difficulties inherent in home-school learning with autistic children, namely the overcoming of some of the social communication difficulties which make parent-child engagement problematic and the rigidity of thought, which fosters the home-school divide for many children with autism. These were overcome through the sharing of communication aids alongside reading activities and use of the same strategies (including behaviour and reward strategies) in the school and at home, helping the child to recognise similarities in each setting, and so to respond to parents in the same way as to teachers. There is some evidence to suggest that the home-school reading programme did improve the reading skills of the children in the study, when compared to matched pupils; however, the greatest achievement was in the development of greater parent-child engagement at

136 home, through the bespoke reading activities which were developed and shared by the teacher and parent working together in partnership.

I regard the 12-week home-school reading programme to have been successful because 10 of the 11 families who took part in it were able to introduce and work on reading activities in the home with their autistic children, under the guidance of the children’s teachers. All of these parents reported that they had formed trusting relationships with the teachers, through which they were able to report back on the progress and difficulties encountered. These parents and teachers were able to work together to problem-solve, refine practice and continue with a variety of home-school reading tasks throughout the 12-week period of the programme. The study changed the practice of the participants and also increased the confidence of the adults and children in developing and consolidating skills within the context of home-school reading. It was evident through parent report that the home-school reading activities had also enabled the parents to enjoy greater shared-attention opportunities with their children and to build better relationships through this.

Most forms of data collection throughout the study were completed as planned. The videoing was the only aspect that was not completed to the extent of the original proposal and request. Several parents said they would definitely try to make their own videos after seeing the benefit of the initial school videos of their children. However, six of the families were not able to make videos at all and only five families made two videos (one near the start and one near the end), which was disappointing for staff and resulted in a lack of opportunity to develop understanding of the home context and help the parent to refine their practice. Owing to this limitation, charting the development of parents’ skills and the children’s progress at home was largely dependent upon the parents’ self-reporting in interview, apart from the few videoed examples provided. From the participants’ point of view (as reported in the Phase 4 interviews), the creation of resources and the multimodal communication methods employed during the 12- week programme were reported to be very time-consuming, and teachers in particular felt they would not be able to sustain the work for longer than a fixed period (the 12- week of the programme was manageable but any longer may have been prohibitive). This presents a dilemma for future research because I consider the programme methods

137 (multimodal forms of communication and sharing and provision of bespoke resources for the home) to be vital to the success of the programme, though I acknowledge that this may be unsustainable in the longer term. It seems feasible to suggest that future programmes should be limited in length but of similar scope and intensity to yield the benefits of focused relationship-building and practice development.

Though it has not been verified at the time of writing, I consider it reasonable to speculate that some of the positive impacts of this study will have endured for the participants beyond the end of the project, such as: the teachers’ and parents’ confidence in relationship-building and liaison; parents’ insights into their children’s skills and ways of engaging with them through home-school learning tasks; changes to home and school routines to facilitate shared learning activities. It is worth noting that all parents (11) who were interviewed in Phase 4 of the study agreed that they would like to continue this kind of work in future.

Had it been possible to provide language translation for families who did not speak fluent English, this may have yielded a wider range of participants, more representative of the ethnic mix of Cherrycroft. However, such resources are costly and limited, presenting an on-going challenge for schools such as Cherrycroft to cross language barriers and engage families from a range of ethnicities in home-school learning.