Effective literacy instructional strategies for use by General education teachers with students on the Autism Spectrum

Abstract

This thesis project is a Professional Development Project used to complete a review of literature about what are effective literacy strategies for general education teachers to use when teaching students on the Autism Spectrum, literacy instruction. The researcher took a personal interest in this topic based on her own teaching experience of students on the Autism Spectrum. The most appropriate way to address this question was to complete an exhaustive literature review and synthesis. After a synthesis of the research was completed, four significant findings were produced. The first finding is that according to research, five instructional strategies produce effective results on literacy instruction with students with ASD. The second finding is at the middle school and high school level, comprehension is the area of literacy instruction where most instructional strategies are being applied. The third finding is that the instructional strategy of cooperative learning groups are most effective with students with ASD at the elementary level. The fourth finding is that the most effective instructional strategies can be applied across all three grade levels of elementary, middle school and adolescents: direct instruction (DI) and Class Wide Peer Tutoring (CWPT). These findings are pertinent to the professional development of general elementary teachers with students on the Autism spectrum and will be shared with them through a professional development project in the form of a handout. [from author's abstract]