An International Review of Assessment Tools for Teachers’ Professional Competence in Teaching Autistic Children

Abstract Teachers are key players in the successful inclusion of children on the autism spectrum. However, they often feel that they are not adequately prepared for this challenge. As a result, there are new efforts to improve education training and professional development, but what content needs to be taught and what skills need to be trained to prepare teachers well for inclusion? Teacher training should be based on research findings to strengthen teachers’ competence development in a targeted manner. The current state of research regarding teachers’ competences in supporting students on the autism spectrum appears to be inconsistent and theoretically fragmented. This systematic review therefore offers a comprehensive overview of 52 instruments that claim to measure teachers’ competences in the inclusion of autistic children. These were classified on the basis of the model of teachers’ professional competence by Kunter et al. (2013) in knowledge, beliefs, and motivation, and examined in terms of their conceptualization and the operationalization of these aspects. This review reveals considerable heterogeneity among the instruments, both in their disciplinary and content-related orientations as well as in their measurement quality, but also more fundamental issues: While some promising assessment approaches were identified, a common limitation across most studies was their insufficient engagement with the current discourse on the inclusion of autistic children, which has changed significantly in recent years. The results of this review provide valuable guidance for future instrument development and contribute to a more coherent theoretical foundation for research on teachers’ professional competence in teaching autistic children.