The development of social and emotional skills in students with autism spectrum disorder : a collaborative research in pre-school and primary education

This article presents some of the results of an investigation in which an educational software has been used to support the process of teaching and learning emotional competencies of students with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) disorders enrolled in pre-school and primary education. With it we intend to assess whether through this process you can improve these skills and, at the same time, constitute this teaching as fundamental channel to optimize the social skills of the students. To this end, five students with ASD enrolled in pre-school and primary, aged between 4 and 8 years and education of both sexes participated in a collaborative research among teachers of these students and specialists University during the academic year 2010 / 2011. The results show that after the educational intervention process, the students participating in the research improved its performance in tasks that assess understanding of emotions and beliefs, as well as producing positive changes in social skills; and the development of collaborative methods between School-University impact positively on these processes of learning.