National survey of reading instruction for deaf or hard-of-hearing students in the US

Data reported here come from 267 instructional programs representing more than 13,500 deaf or hard-of-hearing students. The survey's findings show the extent to which different organizational frameworks for instruction (e.g., basal readers, including Reading Milestones [Quigley & King, 1981-1985], the language experience approach [LEA] and those based on a whole-language philosophy) are used with deaf or hard-of-hearing students. This article reports the strengths and limitations of Reading Milestones, standardized reading tests, and readability procedures used with deafer hard-of-hearing students. Results indicate that schools continue to use basal readers and LEA extensively with deaf or hard-of-hearing students; however, almost four of every five programs report using a whole-language orientation to reading instruction with deaf or hard-of-hearing students. Although programs reported using Reading Milestones extensively, analysis suggests a decline in consumer satisfaction with specific aspects of the series. This article makes recommendations for future research into applications of whole language and portfolio assessment to reading instruction for deafer hard-of-hearing students.