Case study: Aiden

Collaborative curriculum planning for Aiden

Aiden is in Year 12 and has a diagnosis of autism spectrum disorder. He struggles to understand other people’s perspectives, and to follow complex instructions. Aiden does not like to give oral presentations. Aiden is interested in the cellular structure of living things. He is particularly interested in genetics and DNA and has decided to study Biology in Stage 6. When he leaves school, Aiden would like to learn more about the medical industry.

Aiden’s reading skills are above average. He can comprehend literal information but struggles to interpret inferential meaning in texts. He has difficulty with:

• the mechanical aspects of writing
• composing and structuring written responses.

Aiden becomes anxious when starting a new topic. He prefers to engage in familiar tasks.  He struggles to understand new concepts when they are first presented. 

Through collaborative curriculum planning, the school’s special education teacher discusses Aiden’s learning goals and priorities with Aiden and his parents. They identify that Aiden requires supplementary adjustments for all subjects.

Adjustments for Aiden

Through collaborative curriculum planning, it’s decided that Aiden would benefit from the following adjustments:

• presenting instructions as a flow-chart or checklist
• use of visual scaffolds to aid memory and retention
• presenting new material in smaller chunks
• linking new concepts to previously learned topics or familiar concepts
• the use of scaffolds and/or graphic organisers to guide the structure of extended written responses.

Aiden’s Biology teacher considers how these adjustments can be used to support Aiden’s learning throughout the unit of work.

Aiden’s Biology teacher also considers the adjustments Aiden will need for the assessment task. The chosen adjustments enable Aiden to access the task and demonstrate his achievement on the same basis as other students. The adjustments are:

• negotiating an aspect of the role of developmental genes in evolution for Aiden to research
• creating checkpoints for Aiden to follow, to help him to complete the task
• providing Aiden with 3 relevant sources he can use to gather information for his response
• negotiating an appropriate medium for Aiden’s response. Aiden may create a multimedia presentation, video, or animation, or the website as described in the task. Whichever medium Aiden uses, his response will need to inform and engage his audience
• providing Aiden with a scaffold to plan his response.

Marking guidelines provided with the assessment task will be used to assess all students’ responses, including Aiden’s. The adjustments provided for Aiden do not impact on the outcomes to be assessed, or the knowledge, understanding, and skills students are to demonstrate.