Drawing a Blank: Improving Comprehension for Autistic Readers

by Emily D. Iland

Overview

I highly recommend this book for use with all individuals who have problems with reading comprehension. — Temple Grandin, PhD

Improve Reading Comprehension for Autistic Individuals

Although they may be excellent readers, those with autism often need support for comprehension. Comprehension difficulties are subtle, qualitative, and difficult to tease out. As a result, their substantial level of risk for reading comprehension problems is often overlooked or unaddressed, and many students struggle in silence.

This is where Drawing a Blank comes in. Even the most competent educational professionals in both general education and special education settings have limited training and experience helping autistic readers. Using a clearly stated and well-organized approach, Drawing a Blank provides educational professionals and parents with the tools to improve comprehension for good readers who have comprehension difficulties, as well as readers who struggle with both decoding and comprehension. This book explains where and why comprehension failure occurs and offers evidence-based and promising practices to use, based on a thorough assessment of a student's needs.

This second edition describes new evidence-based interventions and 15 new research summaries on how to implement them.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781963367409
Publisher:	Future Horizons, Inc.
Publication date:	01/06/2026
Edition description:	2nd ed.
Pages:	390
Product dimensions:	8.50(w) x 11.00(h) x (d)

About the Author

Emily Iland, M.A. is an award-winning author, consultant, researcher, advocate and leader in the autism field. She is the mother of a young man with ASD and brings personal experience and insight to her professional roles including as an Adjunct Professor in the Department of Special Education at California State University, Northridge. She presents a variety of topics at conferences in both English and Spanish, all over the U.S. and abroad. She is known for the clear way she presents complex information! Emily has been actively involved with the autism community for nearly three decades as an educator and innovator. Areas of special focus include reading comprehension, skills for safety & Independence, autism & law enforcement, transition to adulthood, parent training, and community integration.

Read an Excerpt

Introduction

Why Update Drawing A Blank?

For more than 35 years, I’ve been keenly interested in the dramatic differences in skills among readers with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), particularly those with excellent decoding skills but poor comprehension. I’ve gone from being an unsuspecting parent, to a concerned parent, to a professional in the field of special education, actively seeking information and answers.

Because understanding what is read is crucial to the success and lifelong outcomes of those we teach and/or love, I studied the reasons behind the comprehension problem in ASD, read the research about it, and searched for effective interventions. The first edition of Drawing A Blank: Improving Reading Comprehension for Individuals with Autism Spectrum Disorder (DaB) was the outcome of that process.

I started writing DaB in 2006, nearly two decades ago; it was published in 2011. As is customary, writers typically rely on research from the previous ten years. Most of the information I consulted was written between 1996 and 2010. As I’m getting closer to retirement, I knew I had to explore this topic again and discover what has been learned since then to add to the body of knowledge.

In truth, I was hoping that many researchers and educators would be actively pursuing this topic, making DaB obsolete. Instead, foreshadowing here) I was disappointed to discover that in the past 15 years or so there have been no large-scale experimental studies about effective interventions to help readers with autism and comprehension issues.

To make up somewhat for this setback, I was happy to find more than recent 6 meta-analyses or literature reviews about smaller studies on this topic. That is when I realized that it is still important to update DaB. We need to learn everything possible about high impact, effective interventions for autistic readers, even if the studies are small-scale!  The ultimate goal is to provide you, the reader, with the information and tools you need to help your children, students, and/or clients unlock meaning and benefit from whatever they read.

I read and compared the literature reviews, looking for common findings. I summarized highlights from the approximately 10-15 small studies that were reviewed in each literature review. The largest two studies had 45 and 29 participants. The majority of the studies had just 3 participants each, but the information can still be helpful.

Next, I integrated the information into the book chapters in as user-friendly a manner as possible, highlighting new proven and promising interventions.  I’ve tried to weave together as much relevant information as possible to help you develop a deep level of understanding of the issue of reading comprehension issues and autism, the causes and effects of the difficulties, and how you can help.

I hope that you’ll feel like an expert on the topic when you read and refer to this version of Drawing A Blank, to help you in teaching and advocating for the needs of readers with ASD.

Happily, I’ve also discovered that much of the information and foundational material from the first edition of DaB is still valid, so I’ve kept it in this version. Several promising strategies from the first edition of DaB have since been endorsed by recent studies and are presented with their new “effective” status.

Table of Contents

Foreword

Introduction

Prologue: A Personal Perspective on a Pressing Problem

Chapter 1: Autism & the Task of Reading: An Overview of the Reading Process, Comprehension, and Hyperlexia

Chapter 2: Autism Spectrum Disorder & the Comprehension Connection: Social-Communication and Language Features

Chapter 3: Autism Spectrum Disorder & the Comprehension Connection: Behavioral and Sensory Features

Chapter 4: Putting It All Together: Cognitive Models in ASD

Chapter 5: Masking and Unmasking: Identification and Assessment of Comprehension Issues

Chapter 6: The Search for Evidence-Based Practices to Improve Reading Comprehension in Learners with ASD

Chapter 7: Results from Single-Case Research to Improve Reading Comprehension in Learners with ASD

Chapter 8: Building Vocabulary: Promising Practices to Improve Comprehension

Chapter 9: Innovative and Creative Ways to Improve Comprehension

Conclusion

References

Appendix A: The Fourth Grade Turning Point

Appendix B: Assessments that may be revealing

Appendix C: Teaching materials

Appendix D: Word Parts

Editorial Reviews

I get asked by parents all the time about their child's problems with reading comprehension. This book provides lots of practical, easy-to-teach methods for improving vocabulary and comprehension. Some of the teaching tools include teaching synonyms, looking up pictures on the Internet to teach nouns, and using lists of words with different shades of emotional meaning such as naughty, bad, and evil. I highly recommend this book for use with all individuals who have problems with reading comprehension. — Temple Grandin, Ph.D., author of Autism and Education and Developing Talents: Careers for Individuals with Autism

This is the book we have been waiting for! Until now, little information has been available about teaching reading to students with autism spectrum disorders. In Drawing a Blank, Emily Iland has not only provided dozens of useful ideas for the classroom and home but also a concise review of the literature and a compelling story of her own quest to secure appropriate supports for her son. Every reading teacher in K-12 schools needs two copies one to keep and one to pass on to a colleague. — Paula Kluth, Ph.D., author of You're Going to Love This Kid : Teaching Students with Autism in the Inclusive Classroom

Drawing a Blank offers practitioners and families practical strategies for supporting reading comprehension for learners with ASD. The text format is easy to read and well structured to support quick access to specific strategies and ideas. Most importantly, Emily Iland recognizes the limited research on reading comprehension and ASD, while offering suggestions for making sound, individualized instructional decisions. This text will be a wonderful resource for parents, teachers, and many others! — Christina Carnahan, Ed.D., associate professor of special education, the University of Cincinnati, and co-editor of Quality Literacy Instruction for Students with Autism Spectrum Disorders

From the Publisher