Journal article shows the significant impact of intensive early intervention at Little Learners

We are excited to announce the publication of a peer-reviewed journal article looking at the progress children made when they participated in early and intensive intervention at Little Learners.

What was the purpose of the paper?

The paper describes the Little Learners program and explores the progress 154 children made when they received one year of intensive support (27 hours a week) in predominantly 1:1 formats with some small group instruction.

What are the key findings?

At the group level, children demonstrated significant improvements in their cognitive skills, with developmental improvements in nonverbal, verbal and overall cognition.

Adaptive behaviours also showed significant improvements, demonstrating that the skills children acquire during intervention are being used in everyday life with their families.

Promoting a desire to move away from research that benchmarks autistic children in comparison to neurotypical peers, this paper used a measure of “learn rate” which allowed exploration of intra-individual change for every participant. Examination of learn rate allowed comparison of each child’s rate of learning prior versus during intensive early intervention. Across the 154 participants, the majority showed an increase in their learn rate whilst receiving intensive early intervention.

Specifically:

• 84% of children showed an acceleration in their rate of learning during their time at Little Learners.
• More than half (52%) doubled their rate of learning in this time.

What does this mean?

Intensive early intervention can meaningfully accelerate the rate of learning of young autistic children in Australia, thereby laying the foundations for future learning. Given EIBI is scientifically supported and assuming EIBI can be delivered in a manner that is joyful and safe for children and families, we must ensure programs like Little Learners remain an accessible intervention option for young autistic children.

For more information

Read the Journal Article in full.