Recommendations

In light of the study findings, the researcher reached the following recommendations:

  1. Given its positive results in helping students with moderate intellectual disabilities acquire functional skills, the proposed functional curriculum must be applied in intellectual education institutes and comprehensive rehabilitation centres in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, for both male and female students.
  2. It is necessary to review the intellectual education curricula currently adopted in the institutes and programmes for the different intellectual disability categories. It is also necessary to include functional skills in all domains (academic, independent, social and professional), and not to limit them to students with moderate intellectual disabilities.
  3. Persons in charge of intellectual education programmes need to capitalize on the skills and instructions in the proposed functional curriculum and apply them in integration programmes of intellectually disabled persons.
  4. Special education teachers must be trained on how to use the functional curriculum in teaching and training students with intellectual disabilities.
  5. The family partnership standard must be actively applied in planning, implementing and evaluating the curricula of students with intellectual disabilities.
  6. It is important to apply community-based training and rehabilitation in intellectual education institutes, through forming partnerships between the Ministry of Education institutions and private companies in various fields. These partnerships serve the training of students in real-life settings and facilitate their transition to the work environment.
  7. It is important to dedicate workshops to train students with intellectual disabilities on job skills, such as secretarial work, flower arrangement and gift wrapping, hairdressing, carpentry work...
  8. A computer programme and an electronic database for the functional curriculum can be developed to serve as a reference for special education teachers, so as to facilitate the implementation of each student's individualized education plan.