Teaching strategy: The key to supporting learners with autism spectrum disorders’ well-being in Lesotho mainstream schools

Improving the well-being of learners with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) in Lesotho public regular classrooms can be challenging. It may require different teaching strategies or additional support from self-efficacious teachers. This paper aimed to dissect the teaching strategy concept concerning supporting the well-being of learners with autism spectrum disorder in mainstream primary schools in Maseru District within the context of Lesotho. Fourteen participants, including two principals, six teachers and six parents of learners with ASD from two mainstream primary schools in Lesotho, were purposively chosen. Semi-structured individual interviews and observations were employed to generate in-depth data. The data were then analysed thematically. The paper adopted Bandura’s (1986) Social Cognitive Theory (SCT) as the framework for the research design. Overall, participants consider teaching strategies necessary for promoting learners’ holistic well-being, developing intrapersonal strength, promoting learner self-regulation, and increasing learner motivation. Conclusions are made that teachers in mainstream classrooms understand that teaching strategy is a crucial element for bringing desirable changes in the behaviour of learners with ASD. However, they are not well-capacitated to implement these strategies for supporting learners with ASD. It was further recommended that the teachers enhance more differentiated teaching and/or learning strategies and approaches to promote the teaching to keep learners with ASD engaged and learning different skill sets, as these would yield positive results. Key Words:Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD), mainstream classrooms, social-cognitive theory, differentiated teaching strategies, holistic well-being, Lesotho