Awareness and Use of Assistive Technology Devices for Children With Autism Spectrum Disorder: A Case of Open Doors Special Education Center, Jos

The study investigated the awareness and use of assistive technology devices for children with autism spectrum disorder by staff of Open Doors Special Education Centre, Jos. The study population consisted of thirteen teaching staff of the centre. Questionnaire was used for data collection. Descriptive statistics such as frequencies, percentages, means and standard deviation were used for data analysis. The results showed that the respondents were aware of assistive technology devices such as activity schedule (92.3%), pencil grip (76.9%), turn-taking cards (76.9%), communication boards (76.9%), adapted paper (76.9%), tape recorder (100%), electronic tablet (100%), smartphone (100%), computer (92.3%), audio books (76.9%) and software (69.2%). Workshops (69.2%), seminars (84.6%) and social media (69.2%) were the respondents’ major sources of information on assistive technology. Audio books, activity schedule, visual calendar and rule cards among others were not used often by the respondents. The low utilization was attributed to the identified barriers such as epileptic power supply (3.69), high cost of devices (3.62), negative learners’ attitude (2.54) and dearth of adaptable software (2.85) among others. There was high awareness, low availability and low utilization of assistive technology devices in the study area. It was recommended that government should ensure that assistive technology devices and enabling environment for their use are made available to special education centres in the country.