Thank you to Ann Sullivan (author of 'Pathway to Phonics') for flagging up this report which I agree with totally:
Learners with disabilities benefit from more complex reading instruction, Stanford researchers say
Stanford education scholars Chris Lemons and Lakshmi Balasubramanian share strategies for helping students with intellectual and developmental disabilities learn to read.
Students with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD) such as autism and Down syndrome are often left behind when it comes to literacy instruction – casualties of the misperception that at best, they could only read by learning to recognize common words by sight. But researchers are finding that students with IDD, like their peers without disabilities, can benefit from a more complex approach, including phonics, vocabulary, and reading comprehension.
The report is a quick read and provides links to further information.
Ann is based in England and, in effect, has pioneered the need for learners with significant learning challenges to be provided with phonics and pre-phonics instruction and opportunities - and to explore what is possible for special-needs learners. She has devised her own programme and provides a very readable blog.
Ann is a member of the DDOLL international network and alerted this community to the Stanford Report featuring in the previous post via her message (do check out her blog and her work):
Hi All,
Just want to bring to your attention the Stanford Report by Chris Lemons and Lakshmi Balasubramanian that discusses teaching literacy to learners with complex needs.
You might also like to know that since then I have trialled and produced a programme for those with the greatest needs, including those with PMLD. Here is the report from the pilot study.