Effects of Family-Professional Partnerships in Adapted Physical Education on the Fundamental Motor Skills, Adaptive Behaviors, and Physical Activity Levels of Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder and on Parent Satisfaction.
Adding a simple family-school partnership to adapted PE doubles child gains in motor skills, adaptive behaviors, and daily activity.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Feng et al. (2025) ran a 12-week randomized trial. They asked: does adding a family-school partnership to adapted PE help kids with autism?
Kids were split into three groups. One group got the new partnership plus PE. One got PE alone. One got usual school services.
Parents in the partnership group met teachers, set joint goals, and practiced the same motor games at home.
What they found
The partnership group beat both other groups. Kids gained more motor skills, adaptive behaviors, and daily movement.
Parents in the partnership group also rated the program higher than parents in the other groups.
How this fits with other research
The result lines up with Healy et al. (2018). They used a private Facebook group to coach parents in home movement games. Both studies show parents can boost physical activity when given a clear role.
Dyches et al. (2012) pooled 14 studies and found positive parenting links to better child outcomes. Wei’s trial now shows the same link in adapted PE.
Capio et al. (2013) taught parents to run the Prevent-Teach-Reinforce model at home. Like Wei, they saw child gains and high parent satisfaction. Wei extends this idea from behavior plans to gym class.
Why it matters
You can copy the partnership steps in any school. Invite parents to one planning meeting, share a short video of the PE game, and send home a 10-minute practice sheet. This small add-on produced bigger motor and adaptive gains than PE alone. Try it next session.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
PURPOSE: This study aimed to explore the effect of family-professional partnerships in adapted physical education on the fundamental motor skills, physical activity levels, and adaptive behaviors of children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and on parental satisfaction. METHODS: A randomized controlled trial design was used, with pre-and post-intervention evaluations. Participants (n = 40), including children with ASD and their parents, were divided into three groups: (a) a family-school group (FSG-A, n = 14), (b) a school group (SG-B, n = 13), and (c) a control group (CG-C, n = 13). RESULTS: After 12 weeks of intervention, the within-group comparison revealed that the FSG-A performed better than the SG-B and CG-C for all variables. The among-group comparison further revealed that the FSG-A had greater fundamental motor skill scores than the SG-B (p = 0.021) and CG-C (p < 0.001), had greater adaptive behavior and family-professional partnership scores than the SG-B and CG-C (p < 0.001 for all), and had higher physical activity levels than the SG-B (p < 0.05) and CG-C (p < 0.001). CONCLUSION: This study underscores the significance of robust family-professional partnerships in exercise interventions for children with ASD.
Journal of autism and developmental disorders, 2025 · doi:10.16470/j.csst.201802013