If the reading difficulty is in abstract comprehension, that is typical for people with autism as so much of that is socially based... things like character motivation, etc.

Also reading aloud to someone else is sometimes difficult due to stress.

Or, as Brenna noted above, your child may be a "curriculum casualty" - someone who doesn't respond to whatever your district has adopted as the standard curriculum for the general education classroom. In that case, your child needs a different approach and a good special ed teacher can identify which approach will work and provide that.

If the difficulty is with concrete comprehension (detail recall, sequencing, etc.), or silent reading fluency (decoding words and reading them smoothly when reading without someone staring at them), there is something else going on, and your child may have a learning disability such as dyslexia. You would need to have an educational diagnostic (intelligence and achievement testing) to know for sure, done by someone who is accurate at testing kids with autism. For example, extra time has to be taken before testing to build familiarity with the tester, certain tests are better than others because of socially biased content, or focusing on verbal skills rather than non-verbal, etc.

While you are trying to work with your school, and possibly an independent evaluator if the school isn't doing things satisfactorily, to try to peel this apart, meanwhile, just keep getting your child books focused on his highest interests, preferably actually a little below his current identified reading level so that he doesn't feel it's a struggle. Get him to love reading by having it be a part of his favorite topics.

Another thing to add to what Michelle said...and I agree with ALL of her message... A friend with autistic kids (who is also a special ed teacher) reminded me that, just as my own kids have auditory processing problems, some kids have visual processing problems. It may take an excruciatingly long time for them to process words visually. But as Michelle said, that's something that you would need a diagnostic on.

Mary,

Both of my older children (one PDD-NOS and one Asperger's) had problems reading. The problem was that their school district was teaching only sight words and not phonics. 90% of children can learn sight words, but none of my three could. Many schools have Reading Recovery programs that teach phonics. Those programs work especially well for kids that have problems with sight words. After a year each in the RR program, both of my older kids are advanced readers...3 or more years above others their own age.

Luckily, my youngest was in a program that taught both sight words and phonics, so she learned to read in a way comfortable to her and didn't require extra help.

I'd say first to find out HOW they are trying to teach your grandson to read. Chances are, they aren't teaching him phonics. It makes all the difference in the world to the kids.

Brenna

For my son the mechanics of reading came easy. As mentioned earlier, for many of these kids comprehension is well below his ability to decode. I agree with the finding the high interest book!

I've always tried to have my son read or listen to fictional books, BECAUSE of the social lessons he can be exposed to through discussions about the pictures and characters personalities and motives. (Yes, below grade level).

Here is a link for a spreadsheet that shows the components of Reading Programs used in schools. Look for the link in the 2nd paragraph of "Learning to Read" section. I just saw it this week.
http://www.wrightslaw.com/info/read.index.htm

I'd like to have my son assessed for reading problems, but I will wait until we have moved and settled - and someone has the time to get to know him, as @A MyAutismTeam Member said.

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A MyAutis...

Most of these evaluations have been done. His processing time is longer than normal and it doesn't matter whether the input is auditory or visual. We let him pick out books that are of interest to him on a regular basis but it doesn't encourage him to read. He can focus on and understand what he's building with his Legos though! LOL!