Welcome to Ducks on the Moon, an Afternoon of Music Theatre as Professional Development about Families and Autism Spectrum Disorder

As a playwright-actor-researcher, Burke (2010) created, toured, and published a one-woman play, Ducks on the Moon (DOTM) about her (and her family’s) journey from denial to acceptance to celebration of her youngest son’s diagnosis of autism spectrum disorder (ASD) during his first 5 years. DOTM is not only a drama, but also an arts-based educational research (ABER) project; Burke (2010) labelled her methodology “performative memoir.” In this current project, seven songs were added to the play. As authors-researchers we performed DOTM as a workshop to pre-service and in-service teachers. In particular, we wanted to see if DOTM might serve as professional development (PD) or might become part of a teacher education curriculum. The research questions were as follows: What was the audience’s general reaction to the play-with-music DOTM? And, what might be the implications of such an experience for educators? Did the audience feel that the play-with-music was useful as a vehicle to relay information about ASD and family–professional relationships? Might DOTM serve as PD for in-service teachers or as part of curriculum to prepare pre-service teachers for inclusive practice? We uncovered five inter-related themes: the audience enjoyed DOTM and claimed it was also it was educational, they experienced a range of emotions, they stated that parents need to come to terms with their child’s diagnosis in their own time, many teachers identified with Burke as a mother, and finally, DOTM would make productive PD.