Reports of life skills training for students with intellectual disabilities in and out of school.
Life-skills teaching is nearly absent for high-school students with ID and rarely continues after graduation.
01Research in Context
What this study did
The authors asked high-school staff how much life-skills teaching students with intellectual disability get.
They also tracked whether any in-school training linked to services after graduation.
The study used surveys and record checks, not an intervention.
What they found
Students received almost no life-skills lessons during school.
School training did not predict who got help later.
Life-skills support stopped for most after they left high school.
How this fits with other research
Fedoroff et al. (2016) show the same service cliff also hits students with autism.
Baker et al. (2005) contradicts today’s paper: graduates of one vocational program that baked in life-skills classes had better jobs and daily-living scores.
King et al. (2021) extend the story: parents say teens with disabilities gain big life-skills boosts at summer immersive camps.
The difference is delivery: scarce lessons at most schools versus full programs in the two positive studies.
Why it matters
If you write transition plans, do not assume schools teach daily-living skills.
Push for explicit goals, community practice, and camp or vocational add-ons.
Track whether each skill truly happens before the diploma, not just whether it is written in the plan.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
BACKGROUND: Life skills can be critical to the success of individuals with intellectual disabilities (ID) in terms of postschool outcomes. Yet, research suggests a decreasing emphasis on the acquisition of life skills in school for students with ID, raising the question if students then receive training in these areas after graduation. METHOD: This study represented a secondary analysis of the National Longitudinal Transition Study-2 data to understand the reported receipt of life skills instruction in school and out of school for individuals with mild and moderate/severe ID. Frequency distributions, significant tests and a t-test were used to understand receipt of life skills in and out of school for both individuals with mild and moderate/severe ID. RESULTS: The results suggest low-reported receipt of life skills instruction/training in school and postschool for individuals with mild ID, few students with moderate/severe ID report receiving life skills training out of school, and receipt of life skills instruction in school is not related to receipt of life skills training/therapy after school by either individuals with mild ID or moderate/severe ID. CONCLUSIONS: Given the current educational policy situation (i.e. a predisposition towards inclusive general education placements for students with disabilities and participation in the accountability system for all students), educators who believe in the value of a life skills curriculum will need to be creative in its implementation and look towards transition plan and activities to provide students with the needed training. Regardless, teachers will need to rectify providing students with the academic skills they need to be successful on a general large-scale assessment with providing them with the life skills (e.g. independent living, daily living, financial) to be successful after school in employment and independent living.
Journal of intellectual disability research : JIDR, 2010 · doi:10.1111/j.1365-2788.2010.01339.x