Water Safety Rewards Scheme for special education students with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD)

Purpose: This scheme is aimed at providing water safety teaching resources and assessment programs for special needs students, specifically targeting students with mild to moderate Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). In Hong Kong, despite the fact that there are a number of organizations that provide different kinds of activities to promote the importance of water safety and spread awareness about being safe in the water for the public, these activities or teaching methods could not be fully beneficial for students with ASD due to their special circumstances. It aims to improve their water safety knowledge and communication skills simultaneously. Methodology: This Scheme is a teaching program which enhances the learning motivation of students with ASD through a series of activities and rewards. These activities involve visual and sound animation, which helps students with ASD to understand the materials more easily and allow them to improve their communication skills simultaneously. To access their learning progress, games and videos will be utilized for assessment. Collecting data from 2 aspects : water safety knowledge tests before and after they join the scheme, 30 questionnaires including parent, swimming coach and school PE teacher to evaluate the project's efficiency. Results: More than 80% of parents, coaches or school PE teachers agree that the materials in this scheme are useful for students with ASD. Significant difference in improvement of water safety knowledge among before and after the scheme was found. Conclusion: In conclusion, the water safety scheme can improve water safety knowledge of students with mild to moderate ASD.