Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!snorkelwacker!think!yale!bunker!wtm From: patth@sci.ccny.cuny.edu (Patt Haring) Newsgroups: misc.handicap Subject: Educational Disabilities (3 of 3) Message-ID: <10548@bunker.UUCP> Date: 6 Mar 90 04:44:54 GMT Sender: wtm@bunker.UUCP Reply-To: patth@sci.ccny.cuny.edu (Patt Haring) Distribution: misc Lines: 486 Approved: wtm@bunker.UUCP Fidonet: None Index Number: 7095 Table 3 Total Gains in Percentile and Grade Equivalent Scores for Direct Access and Controls Pre Post Gain Per Grade Per Grade Per Grade _______________________________________________________________________________ Grade 1 DA (38) 7 1.09 32 1.55 25 0.46 Control (27) 46 1.79 56 2.13 10 0.34 Grade 2 DA (21) 17 1.76 32 2.15 15 0.39 Control (36) 54 2.89 58 3.19 40 0.3 Grade 3 DA (28) 16 2.33 31 2.99 15 0.66 Control (28) 56 4.49 61 4.94 5 0.45 Grade 4 DA (52) 15 2.59 31 3.28 16 0.69 Control (53) 60 5.82 61 5.97 1 0.15 DA (20) 21 3.63 38 5.01 17 1.38 Control (38) 56 6.53 60 7.09 4 0.56 Grade 6 DA (13) 3 2.36 15 3.68 12 1.32 Control (17) 71 9.58 74 9.9 3 0.32 Grade 7 DA (21) 8 3.39 26 5.45 18 2.068 Control (18) 35 6.57 36 6.64 1 0.07 Grade 8 DA (9) 5 3.38 21 5.61 16 2.23 Control (10) 34 6.94 35 7.36 1 0.42 Grade 10 DA (7)17 5.58 26 6.65 9 1.07 Control (13) 15 5.25 18 5.6 3 0.35 _______________________________________________________________________________ Total Exper. (209) 12 2.27 29 3.22 17 0.95 Control (240) 52 5.35 56 5.71 4 0.36 _______________________________________________________________________________ During the past year (1988-89) Greensboro and High Point, North Carolina used the Direct Access approach. The average gain on the State mandated California Achievement Test was over 20 percentile points for those children. High Point has mandated the Direct Access approach as the treatment of choice for children who are "at risk" for reading. The next Chapter is a discussion of some of the methods that are consistent with Direct Access. CHAPTER 6 SUMMARY, CONCLUSIONS, RECOMMENDATIONS There are two basic types of reading disabled children, the Phonetic and the Semantic. The Phonetic disabled reader is the child who struggles with every word and has great difficulty decoding. The Semantic disabled reader is the child who will read aloud perfectly, but does not comprehend what was read. One way to identify these children is by observing the direction their eyes tend to move when asked questions about which they have to think of an answer. The Phonetic child will tend to move their eyes to the left and the Semantic to the right. This measure is called Lateral Eye Movements (LEM). One study compared the two groups on a rhyme, case, word/picture matching, and a synonym/antonym tasks. All the words used in the tasks were determined to be in the sight vocabularies of the children. The results of those tasks are shown in Figures 1 and 2. It is clear that the Phonetic disabled children made more errors on the rhyme task which involves the sound of the words. Semantic disabled children, on the other hand, made more errors on the tasks that involved the meaning of the words. There were two graphs on this page which will not be usable in ascii format. THE TYPES OF READING DISABILITY AND READING METHODS Current teaching methods almost invariably use an indirect phonological route to meaning in which the written word is converted to its phonological counterpart so that meaning derives from auditory comprehension. A child comes to school with auditory comprehension, that is, hearing the word "ball" leads to the concept of "a round, bouncy thing". In reading, the letters b-a-l-l must lead to the concept of "a round, bouncy thing". In virtually every case, the child is taught to see the word, say it, and understand it from its sound. This is an effective technique for two reasons. First, it takes advantage the existing auditory comprehension of children; second, it provides the background for the future decoding of new words. As effective as this procedure is for most children, a significant number of individuals are not able to learn under this protocol and they comprise the majority of the children we term "reading disabled." There are two major types of reading disability which flow directly from the indirect phonological techniques that are typically used to teach reading. The Phonetic disabled reader has difficulty in converting the letters of a word to its sound and thus cannot make the first step in that method. The Semantic disabled reader can take that first step, but the sound of the word does not lead to its meaning. The standard methods of teaching reading are well-entrenched and educators sincerely believe that this indirect phonological route to meaning is the best. Therefore, remediation for these "disabled readers" means an intensification of what was not successful in the past. Extensive drilling in phonetic skills has led to an emphasis on teaching to weakness, rather than strength. The imbalance is reflected in reading curricula and standardized tests that stress phonetic decoding at the expense of comprehension. Phonetic decoding is a means to the end of comprehension; it has become an end in itself. An alternative approach to reading which does not depend on an indirect phonological approach to comprehension, called Direct Access, has one basic principle: the meaning of the printed word should not be derived from the sound of that word. Any procedure that avoids the grapheme to phoneme conversion is consistent with this approach. The child is never required to read aloud, but asked to explain what a passage meant. Trivial deviations in verbiage, e.g., "jet" for "plane", are de-emphasized. The stress is on comprehension rather than a slavish word for word decoding. Specific Direct Access techniques will be discussed later. RESULTS USING DIRECT ACCESS Maxwell and Zenhausern in 1983 applied the method to First Grade children who were "at risk" during the second semester. After 25 half-hour sessions, the children increased their comprehension scores from the 26th to the 56th percentile on the Metropolitan Achievement Test and increased their sight vocabulary by over 100 words. A comparable control group showed no gain in comprehension. Minardi, Zenhausern, and Maxwell in 1984 found similar results with Junior and Senior High School children. Using the same regimen of 25 half-hour sessions, the Junior High School students gained an average of 7 months and the Senior High School students an average of 1.4 years. It has only been in the past two years that the Direct Access approach has been used on a full time basis. The results from a 10 week study in Greensboro, North Carolina are show below. The average gain was .95 years or 17 percentile points. Note that the older the child the greater the gains. From the fifth grade on, the children showed gains of at least one year and seventh and eight grade children gained over 2 years on the average. Direct Access is not just for younger children. Both Greensboro and High Point, North Carolina used Direct Access for the past year. On their State mandated California Achievement Test, those children on Direct Access instruction showed an average gain of 17 percentile points above last years scores. SELECTED DIRECT ACCESS TECHNIQUES The results of the demonstration project and the use of Direct Access in the past year in North Carolina clearly show that reading disabled children can benefit from the Direct Access method of teaching reading. To be able to read means that one can get meaning from the printed word. The indirect phonological route attempts to accomplish this by having the reader convert the written word to its phonological counterpart and from this sound derive meaning. Converting the word to its sound is a means to the end of comprehension, not the comprehension itself. Direct Access attempts to derive the meaning of the printed word not via its sound, but directly. The stress is on comprehension, not decoding. One of the first and most basic Direct Access techniques consists of pairing an index card which contains a word and one that contains a picture so that the child can consistently make the pairing. At that point the child can read the word, that is, the child can comprehend the printed word. Note that this is true whether or not the child can say the word correctly or not. The pictures can be provided by the teacher, cut from magazines for homework by the child, or even drawn by the child. The question of abstractions and hard to picture words at first seems insurmountable, but it is surprising how easily a child will develop and remember appropriate pictures. In connection with this aspect, games can be developed to strengthen the connection between the words and the pictures. Variations of Concentration and Old Maid have been used successfully. This pairing, however, is only the beginning of the Direct Access approach. The typical reaction at this point is, "This is nothing new." or "We tried that 20 years ago and it did not work." The next step is the most critical. The words and pictures must be combined into sentences. A word sentence can be covered by the appropriate picture and vice versa. The child should not be asked to read the sentence aloud, word for word. Rather, have the child summarize the sentence, point to a picture from a series that corresponds to it, or even draw a picture of the sentence. The stress should always be on whether the child has understood the basic meaning of the sentence rather than a word for word rendition of it. There are two important side benefits of this approach. One is an increase in spelling skills. The second advantage is the ease with which children can do creative writing using the cards. It is a simple way to separate penmanship from writing. The child could be asked to write the funniest (most exciting, etc.) sentence they can from their words. The step from sentences to paragraphs is minimal. There are two basic approaches to class recitation within a Direct Access framework. The phonetic disabled reader would be asked to summarize a passage for the class and the teacher and classmates could discuss the errors of omission and commission. It also opens the door for class discussion on any relevant issues. The semantic disabled reader would read aloud, but be required to do so with expression to assure that the meaning and not only the words were being read. Of course, any child could be given the opportunity to use either approach. Flash cards are a standard part of the classroom and can be used within a Direct Access framework. Let the children have their pictures in front of them when the words are flashed. They will serve as a cue and minimize the chance of failure. As the children progress, they can turn the pictures face down on the desk and only turn them over as needed. This will strengthen skills and continue to minimize the chance of failure. This technique could easily be converted into a game where more points accrue if a card is not turned over, but the child will always get some points. What happens when a child comes across of word they have never seen before? This is the usual response of people who first encounter Direct Access. There are several approaches to this. First and foremost, the child should be encouraged to determine the meaning of the word from the context of the whole passage. Second, the teacher can tell the child the word and immediately have the child cut out or draw an appropriate picture for that word. Third, the child can be encouraged to look it up in the dictionary just like anyone else who comes across a word with which they are unfamiliar. The child may not be able to pronounce the word, but its meaning will be known. Fourth, phonetic decoding should be an essential part of any reading program. It is an important skill and should not be neglected. On the other hand, it should not be the main approach to deriving meaning from the printed word for some children. There is a temporary remediation procedure to use with Semantic disabled readers. Have the child read aloud into a tape recorder. Then the child can play back the tape while reading from the text material. Although this is an awkward procedure it will allow the child to get meaning from the printed word. Direct Access has a technique for the teaching of spelling and number facts. It has been shown that some children not only do not learn by verbally repeating the word and letters (e.g. "cat, C-A-T, cat", "6 times 3 is 18") but this procedure can actually interfere with learning. As an alternative have the child look at the word and practice forming an image of the letters without saying anything (This is essential!!). When it comes time to spell the word, have the child bring back the image of the letters and copy them. The Direct Access approach does not depend on a rigid structure that the teacher must follow slavishly, but is a general principal that can lead to unique and creative techniques. Furthermore, the method is not limited to the disabled population, but may be an effective strategy for all readers since it has some similarities to "speed reading" techniques. SUMMARY AND RECOMMENDATIONS Summary Reading Disability is as much a physical disability as blindness, deafness and paralysis but a person with such a disability has not received the help offered to those suffering from the latter disorders. The reading disabled child is considered responsible for the disability. The purpose of this paper was to point out that these children can learn to read if only we are willing to change the methods with which we teach reading. The standard approaches to reading demand that the child convert the written word to its sound and, from that sound, derive the meaning. It was shown that 85% of the children we call reading disabled have difficulty making that first step and the remaining 15% can convert the word to its sound, but this still does not give them meaning. The Direct Access approach to reading can help both types of children because meaning is not derived by converting the printed word to its sound. Rather, the sound of the word is derived from its meaning. Several specific techniques using this approach have been discussed earlier in the Chapter. Our brain is capable of many fascinating and wondrous things. Our conscious awareness of our surroundings is somehow derived from light of various wavelengths falling on our retina and causing neurons to fire and not fire. It is this pattern of neuronal activity that gives us conscious experience. Even more amazing is the ability to create literary, musical, and visual works of art. It is the brain that is responsible for all of this. The brain also has a rather obscure function. It can take an arbitrary series of symbols (printed words) and convert them into an equally arbitrary set of sounds (spoken words). This function pales alongside literary and artistic masterpieces. Why have we made it the basis of our educational system? Recommendations 1) Children who are not doing well in school should be tested to determine if they fall into the Phonetic or Semantic disabled reader categories. Children can be tested for Phonetic and Semantic reading disability by means of a test derived from the results presented in Chapter 4. The Phonetic Semantic Reading Scale (PSRS) requires a child to match written and pictorial material on the basis of their sound or on the basis of their meaning. The point would be to identify individuals who do well on one portion of the test and poorly on the other to make a differential diagnosis between the Phonetic and Semantic disabled. 2) Individual preferences in learning strategies should be taken into consideration in selecting teaching strategies. Both lateral eye movements and Hemispheric Preference Test data should be collected on all children. Strategies of teaching that are compatible with the learning strategies associated with these Hemispheric Related Traits should be incoporated into the classroom. 3) Children who are identified as Phonetic or Semantic disabled should be given appropriate alternative approaches to the teaching of reading. The techniques described in the Selected Direct Access Technique section above should be applied to these children. These would include, but not be limited to: a) Alternative forms of class recitation b) De-emphasis of phonics c) Use of word picture vocabulary cards d) Emphasis on comprehension rather than decoding 4) The criteria for success should reflect the capabilities of the child in conjunction with the demands of the culture rather than artificial restrictions. These would include, but not be limited to: a) Speed should be de-emphasized b) Tests should be given on an "open book" basis. c) Calculators should be allowed on mathematics tests. Note that these changes actually reflect the way people operate in the real world. No business places unrealistic time limits on workers or denies them use of tools and references. The major recommendation of this paper is that learning disability should be recognized as an true disability and treated in the same way as more the physical disabilities such as deafness, blindness and paralysis. 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