ABSTRACT

This chapter focuses on how to assess literacy skills pertaining to reading, writing, and spelling of students with complex communication needs (CCN) and will outline key considerations in the instructional process. Literacy development is influenced by the student's linguistic competence, as it is linked to the student's understanding of print concepts, letter-sound correspondence, vocabulary, fluency, and comprehension. The assessment areas described in this reading section pertain to phonological and phonemic awareness skills that are applicable to students with CCN and augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) needs. The purpose of the ALL is to assess literacy skills, specifically sound blending, phoneme segmentation, letter-sound correspondence, single word decoding, sight word recognition, and shared reading. Although these reading skills were discussed in a previous section, the assessment information yielded regarding phonological and phonemic awareness skills is also relevant when creating a comprehensive profile of the student's emergent writing skills.