Reading Lessons Planning With Students With Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities in Mind: Needs-Based Assessment Proposal.

Sánchez-Gómez et al. (2023) built a short teacher survey. It asks what reading help students with intellectual or developmental disabilities need most.

Teachers rate each student on three buckets: representation (decoding, vocabulary), engagement (interest, attention), and expression (comprehension, writing).

The team tested the survey with a small group of teachers and students. They checked if answers stayed the same when teachers repeated the form.

The survey proved reliable. Teachers gave steady ratings when they filled it out twice.

Representation needs topped the list. In plain words, teachers saw decoding and vocabulary as the biggest gaps for students with IDD in general ed rooms.

The result lines up with older work. Chou et al. (2010) and Soltani et al. (2013) both showed that phonological skills drive reading success in kids with mild ID. Victoria’s survey now gives teachers a quick way to flag that same weak spot.

Goo et al. (2020) went one step further. They taught phonemic skills to three elementary students with ID using an iPad. All kids learned the skill. The survey can now steer teachers toward this kind of representation-first lesson.

Thomas et al. (2021) watched real classrooms and saw mostly phonics lessons. Victoria’s tool explains why: teachers already see decoding as the top need.

You get a five-minute teacher form that points straight to the reading domain you should target first. Use it during IEP meetings or before starting instruction. If representation scores high, jump into phonological awareness and decoding lessons. You skip guess-work and start with the skill that research says matters most.