Functional Curriculum and Students with Mild Intellectual Disability: Exploring Postschool Outcomes through the NLTS2

While students with mild intellectual disability receive less attention in research, their educational programming is still important, including the curriculum they receive in school. This study analyzed the National Longitudinal Transition Study-2 (NLTS2) as to the curriculum students with mild intellectual disability received in high school as well as students’ postschool outcomes. Frequency distributions, cross tabulations and logistic regression were utilized to analyze secondary data from the NLTS2. Results indicated few students with mild intellectual disability received a functional curriculum and receipt of a functional curriculum did not influence postschool outcomes. The implications and future directions of these results are discussed. Students with mild intellectual disability once comprised the largest focus in special education and the category was often considered the foundation of the field (Bouck, 2007; Edgar, 1987; Polloway, 2006). But now it is a population in decline (Polloway), referred to by some as the forgotten generation (Fujiura, 2003). Students with mild intellectual disability are now often given other category labels, such as learning disabilities, and lumped into the category of high incidence disabilities or mild disabilities, despite not having mild needs (Polloway, 2004; Smith, 2006). The result of this melding is a loss of specific consideration for students with mild intellectual disability in terms of curriculum, instructional environments, and postschool outcomes (Polloway, 2004; 2005). In fact, Polloway (2004, 2005) wrote a eulogy for the field of mild intellectual disability and cited a lack of attention, research, and advocacy for this population of students and their educational needs. And yet, students with mild intellectual disability still exist and continue to have educational needs and concerns that need to be addressed in research and practice. Attention needs to be paid to this group of students’ educational services and their postschool outcomes. Mild intellectual disability is “characterized by significantly subaverage intellectual functioning, existing concurrently with related limitations in two or more of the following applicable adaptive skill areas: communication, self-care, home living, social skills, community use, self direction, health and safety, functional academics, leisure, and work” (Polloway, Patton, Smith, & Buck, 1997, p. 298). Historically and collectively, students with mild intellectual disability struggled with short attention spans and distractibility (Dunn, 1973; Kirk, 1972; Thomas, 1996; Zeaman & House, 1963, 1979). Other characteristics often associated with this population of students include difficulty transferring and generalizing information, inputting information into memory, and retrieving information from memory (Belmont, 1966; Dunn; Kirk; Spitz, 1973; Stephens, 1972; Thomas). In opposition to the aggregation of students with mild intellectual disability with other high incidence disability categories, Sabornie, Evans, and Cullinan (2006) suggested how students with mild intellectual disability were different from students with learning disabilities and emotional/behavior disorders in the domains of Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Emily C. Bouck, 5146 BRNG Hall, 100 N. University St., West Lafayette, IN 47907. Email: [email protected] Education and Training in Autism and Developmental Disabilities, 2012, 47(2), 139–153 © Division on Autism and Developmental Disabilities Functional Curriculum and Students with MID / 139 IQ and academic achievement/skills (i.e., students with mild intellectual disability had lower IQs and lower academic achievement/ skills). Historically, students with mild intellectual disability have experienced poor postschool outcomes. Although aggregated, in the National Longitudinal Transition Study (NLTS), Blackorby and Wagner (1996) found only a 35% employment rate for students with intellectual disability. In 2009, from the National Longitudinal Transition Study 2 (NLTS2) Newman, Wagner, Cameto, and Knokey indicated only 31.0% of students were currently employed, although the data showed 51.8% had been employed sometime since they graduated from high school. Additionally, Newman et al. found only 14.1% of students with intellectual disability report living independently. For postsecondary institution attendance, Kaye (1997) reported 2.5% of students with intellectual disability participated in some form of postsecondary education; more recent data from the NLTS2 indicated an increase to 13% (Newman, 2005b). Functional Curriculum Given the poor postschool outcomes, one needs to consider the educational programming students with mild intellectual disability receive. In a survey of one state, secondary special education teachers reported a range of curricular offerings for students with mild intellectual disability: 23.8% used a special education curriculum, 19% a functional curriculum, and 15.3% a general education curriculum; the remaining teachers used small frequencies of other models (e.g., lower grade level, vocational education, no curriculum) (Bouck, 2004a). Teachers in this study reported being unsatisfied with the educational programming for secondary students with mild intellectual disability and indicated one of the greatest improvement needs for their program was a more appropriate curriculum (Bouck). One curriculum advocated for secondary students with mild intellectual disability is a functional curriculum (Bouck, 2004b; Edgar, 1987; Kaiser & Abell, 1997; Patton, Cronin, Polloway, Hutchinson, & Robinson, 1989). A functional curriculum, sometimes referred to as a life skills curriculum, is designed to teach functional life skills, or in other words, the skills necessary to live, work, and have fun in an inclusive community (Bouck; Brown et al., 1979). A functional curriculum is presumed to include the functional skills and applications of core subject areas (academics), vocational education, community access, daily living, financial, independent living, transportation, social/relationships, and self-determination (Patton, Cronin, & Jairrels, 1997). A functional curriculum stems from the belief that the general academic curriculum fails to provide students with mild intellectual disability an opportunity to develop skills they will need to be successful postschool and they would not develop these skills unless explicitly taught (Bouck; Sitlington, Frank & Carson, 1993). Hence, a functional curriculum approach is characterized by the consideration of teaching students with mild intellectual disability the skills to help them be productive members of society, and support positive postschool outcomes.