“Howling at the scrabble-board”: exploring classroom literature from an autistic viewpoint

This publication is included in the Autistic Autism Scholarship Project. one author of this publication is identified as autistic in the project.

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Lawrence, C., Celia *, Collyer, E., & Poulson, M. (2020). “Howling at the scrabble-board”: exploring classroom literature from an autistic viewpoint. English in Education, 55(2), 164-176. https://doi.org/10.1080/04250494.2020.1801345

Publication date: 7 Aug 2020 Added to AutiHub: 10 Sep 2026 Type: Article Article language: English
Publisher source (DOI) Full text OpenAlex source

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Authors

Publication authors
4
Publication authors identified as autistic
1 / 4 (25.0%)
  1. Clare Lawrence
  2. Celia * *
  3. Edward Collyer
  4. Melissa Poulson

Abstract

There has, to date, been little discussion of how autism may affect the experience of the reading of fiction for pupils in the classroom, other than through a deficit model. One of the researchers in this study (“Celia”) is training to be a secondary school English teacher and identifies as autistic. Her experience provides an enriched understanding of the subject and enables the study to be undertaken in line with best practice for autism research. Her experiences are explored within the concepts of Theory of Mind, empathic regulation, language awareness and local rather than global processing bias. Impact on managing authentic engagement with texts for all pupils is discussed, together with specific questions for teachers regarding appropriate support for – and celebration of – autistic pupils’ reactions to fiction.

Bibliography cited by this reference

Cited references are imported from external metadata sources when they are available. The list may be partial.

Cited bibliography overview

These indicators describe the bibliography cited by this publication. An author name is counted each time it appears in one cited reference, so the same person can be counted more than once. Names not yet linked to an author already present in AutiHub are treated as unknown, not as non-autistic. Last computed: 12 Sep 2026 18:19.

Cited references
58
With a DOI
38
Without a DOI, from raw bibliography text
18
3 / 58 (5.2%) cited references include at least one author identified as autistic.
References with data to complete
4 / 58 (6.9%)
References with detected author names
54 / 58 (93.1%)
Without detected author names
4
Without a structured title
3
Without a stable identifier
14
References with raw author names still to review
3
References with external metadata lookup issues
0
These indicators apply to cited references displayed on this page, after technical duplicates have been merged. A reference without a DOI can still support author statistics when a title and author names are available.
Author names detected in the cited bibliography
126
From DOI or external metadata
126
From validated raw bibliography text
0
Raw names already validated
0
Raw names still to review
3
31 / 126 (24.6%) names are linked to an author already present in AutiHub. 95 / 126 (75.4%) names are not yet linked.
Names linked to a person identified as autistic
6 / 126 (4.8%)
Calculated across all author names detected in the cited bibliography. Among names linked to an author already present in AutiHub: 6 / 31 (19.4%). Distinct people identified as autistic: 6 / 118 (5.1%).
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