Are we any good? > Department of Education

Interactive Multimedia CD

"The package is excellent. I particularly liked the variety in presentation. I recently completed an online course and found it very hard going. I now know it was because there was only one style of presentation, i.e. text. "

Teacher & Parent of child with autism

Summary of key achievements:

Creation of a practical learning resource informed by world-class good practice guidelines, to be used in schools throughout Ireland.
Design of new interactive multimedia content to make a unique impact on improving autism awareness
Thirty minutes of video scenarios shot in live classroom settings using children with Autistic Spectrum Disorders.

The Challenge

Autism is on the increase - in 2001, the Medical Research Council review of autism concluded that Autistic Spectrum Disorders (ASD) in the UK now affect 60 out of very 10,000 children or 1 in 166. Many children with Autism are educated in mainstream schools. Aurion worked with four project partners to develop learning content for autism awareness training to reach parents and teachers throughout Ireland:

Department of Education in Northern Ireland
Department of Education in the Republic of Ireland
Irish Society for Autism (ISA)
Parents and Professionals & Autism (PAPA)

Aurion's challenge was to bring together the different views of the four project partners to help shape a collectively beneficial training vision. We focused on working to capture the wealth of knowledge and experience on offer, while creating an end product that would be practical, non-threatening and easy to use.

The Aurion solution

Based on our research with the four project partners, and selected teachers and parents, we concluded:

The target audience - parents & teachers, required practical support and easy-to-understand guidance on how to create an "autism-friendly" learning environment.
Parents needed to be reassured that their child's special educational needs would be addressed.

The initial vision for the project was a resource-based pack containing links to Web and text-based resources. However, based on Aurion's unique Instructional Design model, we delivered an improved vision that integrated accelerated learning and interactive multi-media techniques.

The final CD, called "Autistic Spectrum Disorders - A Teacher's toolkit" was delivered to all mainstream schools in Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland. To date, over 20,000 copies have been delivered.