Thirty autistic children in Cork ranging in age from three to 10 are to receive one-on-one tuition following the official opening of a specialised school in the city yesterday.
The Cork CABAS project (comprehensive applied behavioural analysis) on the Boreenmanna Road owes its existence to parent power.
A dozen determined parents who were unhappy with the local provision for autistic children trawled the Internet and discovered the CABAS method. It is based on the teaching methods of Dr Douglas Greer, professor of education at Columbia University in New York, who began applying behavioural analysis to children with behavioural disorders and learning difficulties in the 1980s.
The new Department of Education-funded school was officially launched yesterday by the Minister for Health, Mr Martin.
It employs 30 teachers - one per pupil - in order to deliver a tailor-made system of learning, which responds to a child's strengths and weaknesses.
The facility follows on from a five-year pilot project in Glasheen National School in Cork, in which 12 children were exposed to the CABAS method.
Dr Greer says that using the CABAS method, children can master tasks which would otherwise be beyond them: toilet training, talking, writing and reading. He says that with the appropriate intervention large numbers of autistic children can enter mainstream schools, provided they have extra supports.
"Our pre-school programme began in the US in 1987 and the number of children who have gone on to mainstream education has ranged from a high of 75 per cent to a low of 25 per cent. Those 75 per cent will be just like the regular kids: some will make it, some won't."
The actual teaching method is based on three elements, antecedent, response and reinforce. The programmes involve the child mastering each stage before progressing.
Mr Pat Walsh, a parent of one of the Cork CABAS pupils, says children who are exposed to the method are making substantial progress. "It is fantastic. Children are making tremendous progress. They are being brought into mainstream education. We have got to appropriately educate autistic children."
The CABAS method is based on the concept that if a child isn't learning, the problem lies with the teaching method, not the pupil. However, exponents of the method stress that not every child exposed to CABAS will end up in a mainstream classroom. Some children are lower down the autism spectrum and haven't yet learned to use vocal language. That said, Dr Greer says they can go on to communicate through a picture-based system.
Autistic children find it hard to imitate - one of the building blocks of learning. With applied behaviour analysis, the learning process is speeded up and, in many cases, autistic children are said to be able to catch up with their peers.