In the children's population, autism spectrum disorders have recently become widespread
considerably, which is a test not only for parents but also for teachers who teach these children.
The research work was created with the aim of finding out what opinions about the process of
teaching sports of this group of children with special needs have sports pedagogues, class
teachers and special pedagogues. As part of the “Športni AS” project, we invited 8 sports
teachers, 8 class teachers and 8 special pedagogues with whom we carried out focus groups.
Using a qualitative method of analyzing the content of focus group transcripts, quantitative data
were obtained that enabled statistical data processing. The main categories of the research
related to opinions about the feeling of competence, the experience of teachers in working with
students with autism, the adjustments introduced into the learning process, the opinions and
views on the additional acquisition of knowledge about working with autistics, opinions
regarding the inclusion of autistic people in sports activities and the working conditions they
have.
We found out that sports educators are the most successful in adapting their work to autistic
children, which is also confirmed by their opinion on the sense of competence. According to
the experience of all participating pedagogues, the survey did not reveal differences of opinion
related to the teaching of autistic students in sport. However, differences were found in terms
of opinion and intentions related to additional education and training – sports educators turned
out to be the most favoured here. Sports educators are also leading the way in a positive opinion
about the benefits and sensibility of involving autistic people in sports activities, while class
teachers join them. The conditions in which the learning process takes place are also important
for successful professional work – most of these conditions are inadequate, which affects the
negative opinion of educators about teaching children with autism.
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