‘They’re told all the time they’re different’: how educators understand development of sense of self for autistic pupils

Abstract

School is a site of critical importance in the development of self, yet little is known about the ways in which school affects how autistic pupils come to describe and evaluate themselves. Educators are centrally positioned to support autistic pupils with development of an empowered sense of self. This article reports on a study which captured how staff in four English schools understood development of sense of self for autistic pupils. We found that educators perceived autistic pupils as being affected by both a particular biology and their social encounters with others. Our participants identified the school environment as a significant influencer on sense of self development but seemed uncertain how to make this more enabling. We suggest that one response could be to develop a framework of activism engagement in schools that might enable autistic pupils to work collectively with other autistic people towards a positive sense of self.