Using a Music Therapy Collaborative Consultative Approach - World ...

was selected for participation in this study on the suggestion of his classroom teacher and
parents based on his diagnosis of ASD, tremendous interest in, and positive response to,
singing, and his difficulties with multiple-step tasks such as hand-washing, cleaning-up
and toileting. Andy was a lively and humorous child with strengths in early academic
concepts. However, he was functioning on the Childhood Autism Rating Scale (CARS)
in the mild to moderate range on the autism spectrum. Andy’s communication was
limited and he demonstrated a lack of interest in others. Sometimes he exhibited self-
stimulating behaviors such as hand flapping and he needed assistance with managing
several daily activities. Andy used the Picture Exchange Communication System (PECS)
(Bondy & Frost, 1994) to communicate during mealtimes, and simple objects were used
as visual cues (e.g., a bottle of soap to cue hand-washing) for transitions in the daily
classroom routines. Andy was able to say quite a few words to label objects when they
were in sight or in direct imitation of an adult. When he could not get his needs
expressed, he became frustrated easily and exhibited behaviors such as whining, fussing,
jumping up and down, or pulling on adults. Andy also had some difficulty attending to
language unless it involved a familiar song or physical routine. When enjoying a game or
activity, Andy accepted other children playing with him or nearby. He watched his peers
and sometimes imitated their play. Often, though he liked to play on his own with his
preferred toys (puzzle, magna doodle, books, shape sorters, peg boards).
Andy’s favorite things were to identify letters, numbers, shapes, and listen to music.
He knew the alphabet, was able to recognize all the uppercase letters, and he had already
identified numbers before age two years. Andy received speech/language and occupational
therapy services while in the classroom, and weekly external speech language services.
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