**Author details**

**2.4. Improve the quality of interaction within the family and with peers**

building contexts of joint attention and shared experiences.

can build his/her own rhythm and behavioural organization.

when needed or arguing a point of view.

688 Recent Advances in Autism Spectrum Disorders - Volume I

space, rhythm and position.

**3. Conclusions**

prove communicative efficiency.

clue to the communicative situation).

for his/her turn, complying with rules of specific games or sports).

Attention to the child's interests, interactive strategies, communication breaks or triggers to disruptive behavior may enable parents to improve the quality of the family's interaction. All must be willing to proceed to changes in routines, responses and automatic reactions.

Observing and identifying child's interests, behaviour and communicative attempts are es‐ sential to attribute effective value to the interaction and to respond to it in a productive way,

Including the child in the family's dynamic means to comply with the same rules and limits that are applied to the other members. But close observation may also indicate that for some children more clear routines and limits may be useful. An agreement about a sequence of activities (such as choosing a toy or game, playing with it and storing it away when finish‐ ed) may help the child to organize his/her expectations. Specific strategies may be needed to maintain the agreed procedure, but it may be essential to be consistent with it until the child

In the presence of peers (siblings, cousins, friends' children) take advantage of the opportu‐ nity to encourage the child to share objects and toys and to respect collective rules (waiting

Use unexpected situations to help the child to learn how to cope with them. Depending on the child's level, it can involve: searching for a lost item, fixing a broken toy, asking for help

Encourage the child to engage in organized activities or combinatory play, such as building blocks, puzzles, logical sequences of pictures, narrating stories. Using concepts as time,

Use and encourage the combined use of speech and gestures and facial expressions to im‐

Try to adapt the length and complexity of phrases and language to the child's language lev‐ el and to guarantee the child's attention (using eye contact, physical contact of other sensory

Be aware of the result of your communicative initiatives, as shown by the child's reactions or answers. Try to identify what are the most difficult points to the child's comprehension

The suggestions presented are mostly examples on how everyday life activities and routines can be used to increase the opportunities to improve the ASD child's communicative abili‐

and be prepared to communicative breaks and alternatives to solve them.

ties and their creative use as an important part of the whole development.

Fernanda Dreux Miranda Fernandes\* , Cibelle Albuquerque de La Higuera Amato, Danielle Azarias Defense-Netvral, Juliana Izidro Balestro and Daniela Regina Molini-Avejonas

\*Address all correspondence to: fernandadreux@usp.br

Department of Phisical Therapy, Speech-Language Pathology and Audiology and Ocupa‐ tional Therapy, School of Medicine, Universidade de São Paulo, São Paulo, Brazil
