The Picture Plus Discussion Intervention: Text Access for High School Students with Moderate Intellectual Disability

Abstract

Students with moderate intellectual disability often experience limited access to age-appropriate texts due to limitations in reading skills, access to instruction and supports, and educator beliefs. Use of text read alouds is an emerging tool for increasing such access; however, supports are often still required for access to age-appropriate texts. The purpose of this study was to investigate the use of the picture plus discussion (PPD) intervention on the comprehension abilities of high school students with moderate intellectual disability when expository texts were read aloud. A multiple probe design was used to measure the effect of this intervention across three different types of texts including leveled readers, stories from a local newspaper, and sections from employee handbooks. Results indicate that the PPD intervention was successful in increasing student comprehension as measured by story retell. Implications and future directions for research and practice are discussed.