Summary of key points

• Any approach that successfully works with adults with learning disabilities must address their psychosocial, technological and educational needs.
• An effective training plan is:
  • Individualized - based on learners' strengths and struggles
  • Participatory - input comes from both learners and practitioners
  • Flexible - able to adapt to change according to the effectiveness of particular strategies or approaches
  • Balanced - covers a number of learners' strengths and struggles
  • Continuous - it is ongoing and is revised and modified as needed
• Strategies help learners process and manipulate information and help them to plan, monitor and self-evaluate. They need to be chosen and developed for learners based on an assessment of their strengths and weaknesses.
• Strategies that are both effective and efficient share the following features:
  • Content - the steps in the strategy and what they are designed to facilitate during the learning process
  • Design - the steps are put together to facilitate learning and future use of the strategy
  • Usefulness - the strategy has the potential to be transferable to everyday needs
• The actual "teaching process" of the strategy itself, is the key to success. If a strategy is not taught properly then it is less likely that learners will see success, repeat the strategy and learn to use it independently.