Abstract

Statistics reveals that Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) becomes prevalent in recent years. Among 68 children, 1 is reported as being on the spectrum. Children with ASD often encounter a variety of challenges in their academic life, most of which are supposed to be attributed to the core symptoms of ASD. This study attempts to explore the effects of the pedagogical application of corpus on children with ASD by analyzing the visualization function of corpus tools on children with ASD. This research involves 30 children (aged 8–10) who have been diagnosed as being with ASD on the mild side. They have spontaneous utterances in their L1 and most of which are of pragmatic functions. Compared with the normally developed peers, these 30 children have shown difficulties in learning a foreign language. This article assesses the visualizing function of the pedagogical application of corpus on helping them overcome the difficulties: they can be seated longer during the class; they pay more attention to the instructor and peers; and they respond more frequently to the instructor and peers. Hopefully, this article can provide some constructive suggestions for foreign language teaching and learning for children with ASD.

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