Literacy

1. Literacy Susan Balandin

2. Literacy Bill of rights • All persons, regardless of the extent of their disabilities, have a basic right to use print. Beyond this general right, there are certain literacy rights that should be assured for all persons. The right to : • An opportunity to learn to read and write. Opportunity involves engagement in active participation in tasks performed with high success

3. The right.. 2. To have accessible, clear, meaningful, culturally and linguistically appropriate text at all times. Texts, broadly defined, range from picture books to newspapers, to novels to cereal boxes, and electronic media 3. To interact with other while reading, writig or listening to a text. Interaction involves questions, comments, discussions and other communication about or related to the text

4. The right to 4. Life choices made available through reading and writing competencies. Life choices include, but are not limited to, employment and employment changes, independence, community participation, and self advocacy 5. Lifelong educational opportunities incorporating literacy instruction and use. Literacy educational opportunities, regardless of when they are provided, have the potential to provide power that cannot be taken away.

5. The right to 6. Have teachers and other service providers who are knowledgeable about literacy instruction and principles. Methods include, but are not limited to, instruction, assessment and the technologies required to make literacy accessible to individuals with disabilities. Principles include, but are not limited to, the beliefs that literacy is learned across places and time, and no person is too disabled to benefit from literacy learning opportunities

6. The right to 7. Live and learn in environments that provide varied models of print use. Models and demonstrations of purposeful print use such as reading a recipe, paying bills, sharing a joke, or writing a letter. Yoder, Erikson, & Koppenhaver, 1997 www.gac.edu/-dkoppenh/rights.html Literacy enriches our lives and allows us to connect with the world. Balandin, 2002

7. Emergent Literacy • Literacy learning begins at birth and emerges over time • Speech production is not a prerequisite to literacy • It is never too late to start • Parents early concerns/expectation do not include literacy

8. Activities • Stories • Songs + written name rev cognition, letter naming • Constructing stories to read • Combination of approaches to suit eh learner • Others?

9. Recent studies • People with DD have limited reading skills • Koppenhave, Pierce, Steelamn, & Yoder, 1995 • Assessing reading skills of people with intellectual disability • Cupples & Iacono, 2000 • Those with CCN associated with physical disability • Dahlgren Sandberg, 2001

10. Include • Developing phonological awareness and reading assessment tasks for people with Down syndrome • Non spoken response forms • Develop tasks that underlie reading and reading related skills (e.g., phonological awareness) • PA provides the basis for grapheme-phoneme awareness

11. Strategies • Word analysis and whole word approaches are effective • Word analysis encourages and supports generalization of skills to words not taught • Assessment of Phonological awareness and reading (APAR)

12. Assessment of Phonological Awareness and Reading • READING TESTS • Reading real words • Reading non words • Comprehension of written words • Comprehension of written sentences • Comprehension of written texts

13. Phonological awareness tests • Blending real words • Blending non words • Phoneme counting- adults/children • Phoneme analysis

14. Listening comprehension • Sentence plausibility • Grammaticality judgments • Comprehension of textshttp:/www.med.monash.edu.au/general-practice/units/cddh/accessability2

15. Strategies • Accessible word reading intervention • Australian Mouseover- Rob Seiler http://www.elr.com.au/apar/bropwser/index.htm Internet Explorer is best for these sites My Browser http://www.elr.com.au/apar/browser/index.htm

16. Lessons • Limited availability of computers • Limited or no experience of independent use of computer • Individuals difference in willingness to work on reading • Importance of customization

17. Web access for literacy development • People with limited literacy skills and physical access problems • Developed a web site that: • Required basic literacy skills • Incorporated literacy training • Facilitated use of various access techniques • Reading intervention web site that evolved through increasingly advanced versions • Reading other web texts

18. Lessons • http://www.ling.mq.edu.au/AccessAbility • Most people wanted to improve • Problems with reading and PA • Most texts on web too hard • Web sites need to be trialed by users of varying proficiency • Technical difficulties must be resolved independent of the intervention or people give up

19. Cont. • High level of interest in web but it must be made accessible and used on a regular basis • Many people will require ongoing assistance • Access to technical assistance is important • Focus groups are useful to evaluate projects at different stages