Success beyond limits: expressive arts workshop activities as good practice in adaptive functioning of low‐functioning autistic individuals

Abstract

The potential of using expressive arts workshop activities at school to achieve an inclusive classroom context for individ‐uals with ASD autism is the focus of the present work, which considers expressive activities as active methodological strategies, both to work on the level of personal variables, that is, on the level of the affective, cognitive and relational dimension of the subject and on the level of the contexts in which he or she is embedded. This was in light of the analysis of national and international literature that allowed us to cross‐reference data on the expressive arts in an interconnected way and touch on how these types of arts function as "activators" for processing hidden thoughts and feelings, for im‐proving abstract thinking skills, and for both verbal and nonverbal communication in individuals with ASD. Specifically, the expressive arts act as active mediators in the construction of the entire psychic apparatus, from where all those sym‐bolic and perceptual dimensions emerge that are useful for successful adaptive functioning in cognition, participatory activities in general and specifically in learning.