Applying Mediating Learning Practices in Community-Based Early Interventions for Children With Autism

ChildhoodMary, an early interventionist, has been working with a family who has a toddler named Henry, diagnosed with autism.Upon learning of his diagnosis, Henry's parents felt overwhelmed and received mixed messages from different doctors and professionals, which only added to their stress.They struggled to get Henry's attention and were concerned about his language development.Initially, Mary worked with Henry's parents using activities to help promote his social skills, but progress was slow.Mary began to use the Building Interactive Social Communication (BISC) approach, which uses mediated learning practices as a framework to promote both parent and child learning.This article follows Mary and Henry's parents' journey in applying mediated learning practices to enhance Henry's social learning.Involving caregivers in early intervention and utilizing caregiver-child interactions has been shown to directly benefit child learning (Bottema-Beutel & Kim, 2021;Patterson et al., 2014).Both the Division for Early Childhood (DEC, 2014) and the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC, 2020) highlight the importance of building 1372137Y ECXXX10.1177/10962506251372137YOUNG EXCEPTIONAL CHILDRENParent-medaited intervention practices for autism / Liu et al.