Literacy
Research-based practices for creating access to the general curriculum in reading and literacy for students with significant intellectual disabilities
The purpose of this monograph is to conduct a systematic review of the literature as it relates to literacy instruction for students with significant intellectual disabilities. The review describes the multiple components of comprehensive instruction (i.e., phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary, comprehension, as well as writing and emergent literacy) and identifies research-based practices that address and support learning in each of these areas for students with significant intellectual disabilities, including students with physical and/or sensory impairments. Specific attention is given to the use of assistive and instructional technologies to support literacy learning for students with significant intellectual disabilities.
Erickson, K., Hanser, G., Hatch, P., & Sanders, E. Research-based practices for creating access to the general curriculum in reading and literacy for students with significant intellectual disabilities. Chapel Hill, NC: Center for Literacy and Disability Studies, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. 2009.
Call to Action for the Texas Educator
For evidence based strategies based on the work of Dr. Karen Erickson, participate in the TX CAN online course Teaching Literacy to Students with Significant Cognitive Disabilities.
Who may be literate? Disability and resistance to the cultural denial of competence
Through a critical interpretivist frame, the authors use ethnography and archives to examine themes associated with society's ongoing denial of literate citizenship for people with perceived intellectual disabilities. They link this denial to the experiences of other devalued and marginalized groups to challenge the common perception that citizenship in the literate community is an organic impossibility for people defined as intellectually disabled. The authors present four themes of literate disconnection and, in conclusion, ponder the moral shift necessary to craft a science of literacy for all.
Kliewer, C., Biklen, D., & Kasa-Hendrickson, C. “Who may be literate? Disability and resistance to the cultural denial of competence.” American Educational Research Journal 43, no. 2 (2006): 163-192.
Call to Action for the Texas Educator
Learn more about presuming competence by participating in TX CAN’s online course Presuming Competence in the Putting Inclusion into Practice for Students with Complex Needs series.
