DYSLEXIA

The term “DYSLEXIA” was first used by R.Berlin (1887), a German Opthalmologist when referring to
reading difficulties caused by cerebral disease or injury.

Reading disability or Dyslexia is characterized by low reading achievement, as measured by an

individually administered standardized test of reading accuracy or comprehension that is substantially
below what would be expected given an individual’s chronological age, measured intelligence (IQ) and
age appropriate education (APA, 1994)

Developmental Dyslexia was first described by Morgan in 1896 as specific reading difficulty.
Vernon (1962) – 3 categories of backward readers
1. Those whose difficulty was due to environmental factors, such as lack of culture in the home. inefficient
teaching, etc
2. Those who suffered “some form of emotional maladjustment”
3. Those whose backwardness is often severe and may be attributable to some organic or constitutional
factor (specific Dyslexics)

Dyslexia is a type of aphasia where damage to the brain causes a patient to lose the ability to read. It is also
called word blindness, text blindness or visual aphasia. "Alexia" refers to an acquired reading disability, where
reading ability had previously been developed, usually occurring in adulthood conditions, while "dyslexia" refers
to developmental reading disability.

There are two groups of alexia.

 The first or main group is "the central dyslexia" group which includes surface dyslexia, semantic dyslexia,
phonological dyslexia, and deep dyslexia.

The second group, "the peripheral dyslexia" group, includes neglect dyslexia, attentional dyslexia, and pure
alexia which is also known as alexia without agraphia

The three types of peripheral dyslexia are

1. NEGLECT DYSLEXIA:

An acquired reading disorder affecting the READING of letters at one end of the word, usually the left.
Associated with Spatial neglect
[The neurological syndrome of spatial neglect consists of a group of symptoms which are partially dissociable
from each other, and which occur most frequently following a stroke or other form of brain disease that affects
the region surrounding the junction between occipital lobe, temporal lobe and parietal lobe of the right
 hemisphere. In most cases, these symptoms recover with days or weeks, but in some cases they persist for long
periods. The most striking constituent of the syndrome is often known as hemispatial neglect, though the
terminology is inconsistent. Here the patient will ignore items in the left side of space (whether explored visually
or through touch). This failure is not due to blindness in the left half of the visual field, since that is not always
present, and in any case many patients who do have such blindness do not show neglect.]

2. ATTENTIONAL DYSLEXIA:

The attentional dyslexia causes an impairment of reading words in sentences, since the defect causes many
words to be visible at the same time. It is a rare disorder affecting the ability to attend to individual letters in a
written word, although the complete word and the letters presented individually can be identified.

3. PURE ALEXIA:

Pure alexia is one form of alexia which makes up "the peripheral dyslexia" group. Individuals who have pure
alexia suffer from severe reading problems while other language-related skills such as naming, oral repetition,
auditory comprehension or writing are typically intact. Pure alexia is also known as: "Dejerine syndrome",

The three types of central dyslexias are

1. DEEP DYSLEXIA:

Deep dyslexia is a form of alexia (acquired dyslexia) that disrupts reading processes that were functioning
normally before the individual suffered a head trauma to the left hemisphere. Deep dyslexia may occur as a
result of a head injury, stroke, disease, or operation. Deep dyslexia is mainly characterised by the occurrence of
semantic reading errors or semantic paralexias when reading aloud (e.g. view → “scene).

Other characteristics of deep dyslexia include visual errors (eg. thing → “think”) and deviational errors
(e.g. alcohol → alcoholic) as well as poor reading of function words, more difficulty reading abstract than
concrete and highly imaginable words, a complete inability to read non-words, severe impairments when
writing to diction and writing spontaneously, and in many cases an impairment in short term memory, or digit
span.

While the symptoms of deep dyslexia are different and independent impairments of reading, it is rare to
find an individual who only displays some of the characteristics of it; indeed, most patients presenting with
semantic paralexias also demonstrate all of the other symptoms. This has resulted in deep dyslexia being
considered a symptom-complex and has led to much research into why this variety of symptoms may co-occur
in so many patients

2. PHONOLOGICAL DYSLEXIA:
 It particularly affects the ability to pronounce novel letter strings. The ability to read previously familiar words
may be spared or partly impaired. Grammatical words and abstract words can be read, sometimes as
successfully as imageable and concrete words. Visual errors occur, but not semantic errors.

Phonological dyslexics have impaired reading ability because they have a deficit in phonological processing.
Phonological dyslexics have a difficult time with written language because they have an impaired ability to
deconstruct written words into phonemes, thus preventing word identification. This low level phonological
deficit prevents words from reaching high level linguistic processing, which would allow the reader to gain
meaning from the text. Thus, dyslexics have intact memory and comprehension language processes that are not
activated because they can only be activated after a word has been identified through phonological processing.
Phonological dyslexics have difficulty with reading while remaining intellectually capable of processing very
complex thoughts and ideas

3. SURFACE DYSLEXIA:

Surface Dyslexia, which is similar to dyseidetic and visual dyslexia is a subtype of dyslexia characterized by a
difficulty in the lexical access of word meaings. This means that surface dyslexics are able to recognize that
printed words are words, but are not able to access the definitions from within their internal lexicon by way of
the visual image of the printed word. Surface dyslexics do however process auditory words with little difficulty,
and possibly with greater speed and efficiency than normal non-surface dyslexics.

It affects the ability to pronounce and comprehend previously familiar words with irregular spelling-sound
correspondences, for example pint, and affects less frequent words most. These words are often
mispronounced using more regular pronunciations. Familiar words with regular spelling-sound
correspondences, such as mint, are pronounced most successfully. The ability to pronounce novel letter strings
is either normal or only partly impaired.

READING
Reading is a hybrid consciousness, half meaningful and half imaginative. (Jean Paul, 1950).
Reading comprises of 2 component processes.

1) language processing skill (LPS)

2) phonemic awareness(PA)
The LPS comprise speech perception, vocabulary skills as in naming short term memory, syntax, and
semantics.

Phoneme awareness is the sensitivity to the constitute phonemes in errors. It is associated with English
language alphabets. In some of the researches the results indicate that poor readers are deficient in all
aspects of language processing skills, excepting syntax and semantics and constantly pointing to the
 power of phoneme awareness in predicting future reading ability and achievements among the beginning
readers.

Stage theory of learning to read:

According to Jean Chall he has provided certain ways to conceptualize reading development in terms of
stages.

1) stage 0
2) stage 1
3) stage 2
4) stage3
Pre-reading or emergent reading (stage -0):

This stage begins in the pre-school years and goes till the child reads independently. during this stage the
child learns to comprehend and produce the spoken language. Those who are exposed to literate culture
will learn some function of written language .pre readers listen to stories, read to them in books and
develop the ability to pretend to read. They know how hold the book, how the stories are structured
which include main character, goals, conflicts and reactions and outcomes.

Their vocabulary grows from listening to stories, learn to write alphabets, sing rhymes which enhances
their awareness that language has words, sounds as well as meaning.

Lundberg 1988 showed that pre readers who were trained to segment speech into phonemes before any
instructions learned to read and spell better than who did not get training.

Initial reading or decoding stage (stage-1)

In this stage student understand how the spelling system represents the spoken language. They learn how
letters symbolize words and how it could be combined to form words. So as their phonemic
segmentation grows they are able to detect more and more sounds in words to represent with letters. As
they learn more sounds the knowledge about how sounds are symbolized in the conventional system
grows.
Students begin to builds up vocabulary, so when they are reading if they come across unfamiliar words
the better readers learn to look at letters to figure out words rather than ignore letters or guess letters
based on previously read text.

The fluency stage (stage-2):

Attaining fluency involves becoming faster and more skilled at performing various reading operation
learned at stage 1.The fluency improves by re-reading or reading stories. Re-reading improves the
fluency because during re-reading attention for reading individual word diminishes and hence increases
the attention available for coordinating word reading with text comprehension test. In this stage many
words are added to the students vocabulary. Word attack skills grow as students receive more decoding
instructions and as they recognize common spelling patterns in the sight words they learn to read. Thus at
this stage the student develops the ability to look at familiar words and instantly recognize their
pronunciations and the meaning with out any effort.

Reading to learn stage (stage-3):

This stage enables the reader to comprehend well, even when they have difficult materials whose ideas
are unfamiliar. This is the stage where a student begins to learn new knowledge ,information, thoughts
and new experiences. It is at this stage the teacher expects the students to acquire the information in
subject areas by reading

Text. The material to be read is more difficult than which was the previous stage . intelligence is highly
correlated in this stage with reading skill than other stages.(singer-1977)

Students who have larger vocabularies broader knowledge to the world and superior reasoning skills
have definite advantage in comprehending and remembering what they read at this stage.
Development of reading proficiency :

The beginning reader does not simultaneously master the use of the cue systems. Instead,the process of
learning to read has been categorized as sense of stages(Chall,1983). In each stage the child masters new
dimensions of the complex task of reading.

Children learn to speak and understand language and acquire the knowledge about the world in the initial
pre-reading stage. As they learn to utilize the contextual cues in reading ,their knowledge and language
skills play a vital role. During this period the child also learn that print is also an important medium for
communication they begin to learn the purposes of reading and writing.

Early instruction teaches children to use the simplest structural cues they learn how to hold book, to refer
to words to utilize pictures to turn pages.

Children at this stage know some letter names and recognize certain salient words such as their own
name. in reading disabled students mostly do not have deficits in reading in the pre reading stage but
the exception is failure to acquire the phonemic awareness. The phonemic awareness can be elicited by
asking the students to give the initial sound in the spoken word or to identify it in different positions.

Grade 1 and 2 fall into the decoding stage here the students learn to use letter cues. Most of the reading
disabled students do not complete this stage . decoding could be analyzed by asking the student to read
phonetically , regular words and non sense words.

In the decoding stage the child learns that reading involves use of code words, which are according to the
alphabetical principle by which letters have regular and predictable relation ship with sounds. Children
have to understand that alphabetical principle simplifies the reading process and that they have to attend
to all the letters to read accurately. Decoding programs vary some what in scope and sequence of skills
taught (Carrine et al-1990) but most begin with teaching consonants and short vowels. Students are
taught to sound out letter by letter and to blend sounds so that CVC words such as ‘cat’ can be read.
Some irregular words are introduced and short sentences are read. Students are then taught to attend to
large letter groups to produce proper sounds when reading words. Poor readers expend cognitive
resources in decoding thus reducing the resources available for comprehension, while normal readers
don’t require mental effort thus can direct their attention toward comprehension.

Meta-cognitive skills and efficient reading:

Good readers who possess meta-cognition skills in reading are aware of purpose of reading and
differentiate between talk, demands Eg: reading a text for class assignment vs reading a magazine for
pleasure. They actively seek to clarify the purposes or task demand through self questioning prior to
reading of a given material (Anderson-1950). Due to awareness of reading purpose they will use suitable
reading strategies,Eg: a good reader varies his reading rate and concentration level as a function of
materials that is either text or magazine. He reads text slower with intense concentration than the
magazine. If the reader faces difficulty in comprehending a text he would use problem solving strategy.
These problem solving attempts indicate self- regulation moreover they evaluate their comprehension
themselves, by evaluating it would help them as it is important. The last reading strategy involves a very
basic form of self awareness ( Brown1980) that is if a reader does not realize that he has not understood a
particular part of a given material he will employ strategy like scanning or back tracking to over come
the comprehension difficulties.(Andreson 1980). But LD readers show little such coordination between
the tasks demands and reading strategy. They lack meta-cognitive skills in reading.

The mature reader will not know about his comprehension monitoring only when there is comprehension
failure does he realize it (Anderson1980). The individual immediately slows down his rate of reading and
either reviews the difficult section or reads on seeking information from subsequent text.

Is there a link between reading problems and language problems?

Yes. Reading is a task that most children accomplish quite readily, it poses a scientific difficulty for
some of the children who may be labeled as dyslexic. It is often noted that such children cannot be
distinguished from their more successful peers by general intelligence, motivation, experience; in fact
this unexpected aspect of the problem is at the core of the definition of dyslexia.

Language processing problems associated with poor reading:

The language processing is said to occur in 4 levels.

1)Speech perception

2)Vocabulary skills

3)Phonetic short term memory

4)Syntax and Semantics

1)Speech perception: According to Brady Et-al (1983)they considered the children who did no differ in
IQ, age and audiometry values were varied in reading ability. Children were asked to identify spoken
words or environmental sounds under normal listening condition, under noisy condition and performance
of good and poor readers were compared. Results indicated that whatever the condition good or poor
readers equally identified environmental sounds.

2) Vocabulary Skills: Reading ability can be measured in terms of the ability to read individual words
(decoding) or to understand the meaning of the sentences or paragraphs (comprehension).

3) Phonetic short term memory: It has been noted that poor readers tend to perform less well on the
digit span test and are deficient in the ability to recall strings of letters , non sense syllables or words in
order whether the stimuli is presented through auditory or visual. Poor readers are even deficient in
recalling of spoken sentences.

4)Syntax and semantics: Poor readers do not comprehend sentences as good readers .(Mann-1985).
The good readers differ from poor readers in the repeating and comprehending spoken sentences task
that contain relative clauses like “ dog jumped over the cat that chased the monkey. They also performed
poor for instruction in token test. Like touch small red square and large blue triangle. In some studies
they explain that short term memory deficits leads to difficulty in comprehending complex sentences.
The outcome shows poor readers are sensitive to syntactic structures but cant understand sentence as
they cant hold an adequate representation of sentences in short term memory.

NEUROBIOLOGY
Neurobiology helps us to understand the neural mechanism in different type of learning which could be
studied at the molecular or cellular level.
 The eight step loop in the left brain where reading occurs

Shaywitz (1996) described the eight step loop in the left brain where normal reading occurs.

Step 1. The parietal lobe receives new visual information related to reading.

Step 2. This visual data is fired to the visual cortex where symbols are recognized and organized.

Step 3. This organized visual data is sent to the inferior parietal lobe where sounds connect to the
letters.

Step 4. The sound/letter blends are fired to the superior parietal lobe where speech patterns are
preorganized.

Step 5. This sound/letter data is now fired to the oral language center in the left temporal lobe.

Step 6. The broca area further organized the speech material.

Step 7. This refined speech material is then fired to the Wernicke region, which puts the final touches
on what is about to be spoken.

Step 8. If the person is reading aloud, the speech organs are triggered to say what the eyes have seen
on the page. If the person reads silently, Step 8 translates the reading data into “brain language” that
lets the frontal lobe and prefrontal cortex know that the eyes have seen.

Reading words is a complex act involving the processing of sensory, phonological, orthographic, and
semantic information. Initial studies to find out the brain anatomy changes in normal readers and
dyslexics were done through post-mortem analysis. Recent advances in technology have made it more
possible to explore the brain’s activity while reading and while processing language.

The three neuro-imaging techniques:

 Positron emission tomography (PET),

 functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), and
 Magnetoencephalography (MEG) were used often in these studies.

PET and fMRI assess brain activity by measuring either blood flow or oxygenation during experimental
tasks, resulting in good spatial resolution (Demb et al., 1999).

Whereas, MEG, a variation of EEG, measures changes in a magnetic field, resulting in good temporal
resolution (Hoien & Lundberg, 2000).

STUDYING READER’S BRAINS

Using an evolving technology to understand a process as complex as reading, even word reading, is a
complicated process. Demb et al. (1999) and Grigorenko (2001) noted some of the complications. Brain
functions are highly interactive; making it difficult to determine just what activation is directly related to
the task of interest. For example, when reading a list of words, certain areas may be activated generally
for ‘object recognition’ and others specifically for ‘orthographic processing’ of a word. So one area may
be activated whether a person is looking at the letter ‘k’ or at a fixation point, another area may only be
activated if the person is processing the features of the letter k, that is, the activation is specific to
linguistic stimuli.

For this reason, one commonly used method of studying brain activation is the subtraction method. In the
above example, the researcher would subtract the activation present during looking at a fixation point
from the activation of looking at a letter. The presumption is that what is left relates specifically to
visually processing a letter. To accomplish the goal of identifying what activation is associated with
what task, the researcher must design tasks that represent a process as purely as possible – complex task.
In addition, one must design a series of subtraction tasks with a theory of how reading brain works. This
theory must necessarily assume – reading involves a sequential and linear process, otherwise, - not
possible – subtract one task from the next (Pennington, 1999). If the flow of processing during reading is
more recursive, activation will not occur in a sequential manner necessary to do subtraction – makes
specific sites of activation associated with tasks difficult.

The complexities of isolating a task and corresponding activation are further complicated by several
other methodological challenges – the apparatus used in studies varies – interpretation difficult. Another
factor influencing interpretation is that – some neuro-imaging techniques have good spatial but not
temporal resolution (eg. fMRI and PET) – difficult to evaluate the sequence of a process. Other
techniques such as MEG & EEG have good temporal resolution but poor spatial resolution. Therefore,
looking at a combination of techniques will provide a more complete understanding of the activation
patterns observed.

Demb (1999) suggested three additional reasons that make studying individuals with dyslexia
complicated.

If an individual with dyslexia fails at a task, activation patterns may – reflect failure rather than effort
associated with the task – matched samples.

Some literature indicates that there may be subtypes of dyslexia, - participant selection should need to
reflect these differences.
One must be cautious about making generalizations about children who are acquiring reading skills from
studies using adult readers.

In spite of the difficulties explained above, using functional imaging promising findings have emerged
from the recent findings.

The functional imaging studies seek to understand

What areas of the brain are involved in reading single words,

How these areas interact, and

If these areas function differently in readers with dyslexia.

To observe the brain activity involved, researchers have generally designed tasks to evaluate three areas
related to reading, i.e. phonological, orthographic and semantic processing. To read words, the children
have to integrate information about the sound (phonology) and patterns (orthography) of words.
Competence in each of these areas appears to follow a developmental trajectory with a phonological
stage preceding an orthographic stage (Frith, 1986). At some point in reader’s development, the
phonological repn. is bonded to an orthographic repn. of a word. If bonding has not occurred, the reader
will have lower-quality representation of the words in memory – cannot take the advantage of
redundancy available in phonologic and orthographic information. Therefore, the reader fails to develop
rapid, efficient lexical access (Ehri, 1991)

In an attempt to determine the localization of processes, researchers using neuro imaging have developed
specific tasks designed to isolate phonological and orthographic processing. Rumsey and colleagues
(1997) have used some of the purest tasks in their PET study of typical adult male readers. They have
contrasted phonological and orthographic processing in these readers with a set of four tasks, two
phonological and two orthographic. Participants were asked to determine whether two pseudowords
sound like a real word (e.g. baip or baik phonological task) and which word was a real word (e.g. hoal or
hole). There was considerable overlap of activation in all conditions, making it difficult to differentiate
phonological and orthographic activation. Authors concluded that, although the phonological and
orthographic processes may be different processes, they may not be localized in the brain and the same
neural circuits may be processing both phonological and orthographic information found in words. These
findings could also be interpreted as consiste consistent with Ehri’s (1991) theory, which emphasizes that
phonological and orthographic processes are bonded to one another.

Although cannot be neatly divided into phonological and orthographic regions of the brain, there appear
to be some major circuits involved in reading words.

Pugh et al., (2000) described three major circuits,

A left hemisphere posterior system involves two circuits –

A ventral circuit involves extrastriate cortex and an inferior occipito-temporal area. This area appears to
be involved in reading words and pseudo words and may be word-specific. This may be involved in
orthographic regularity.

Another posterior dorsal circuit includes the angular gyrus, supramarginal gyrus, and superior temporal
gyrus (wernicke’s area). The angular gyrus is believed to be involved in integrating visual and
phonological information.

The third circuit is an anterior circuit located around Broca’s area in the inferior frontal gyrus. This area
has been implicated in recoding phonological information of visually presented word.

It appears that the competent word reader uses both the anterior and posterior systems described above to
read words. Compared to typical reader, the reader with dyslexia appears to overactivate the anterior
circuit and underactivate the posterior circuits. This result has been found consistently across neuro-
imaging techniques.

In the Rumsey (1997) PET study, readers with dyslexia demonstrated reduced activity in the posterior
regions of the brain whether reading silently or aloud. Salmelin (1996) compared readers with and
without dyslexia reading real words and pseudowords silently using magnetoencephalography (MEG).
They found three differences between the groups. The typical readers showed an early response to
reading pseudowords in the ventral circuit of the posterior region of the brain, the readers with dyslexia
showed no early response in this area. The readers with dyslexia did demonstrate an earlier response in
the inferior frontal gyrus, suggesting greater activity in the anterior circuit. The readers with dyslexia
demonstrated a later response in posterior language regions. This study using MEG, which permitted
analysis of the reading process over time, supported the finding that readers with dyslexia overactivate
circuits with an early response to stimuli and underactivate posterior circuits with a late response.

BRAINS OF INDIVIDUALS WITH DYSLEXIA

The study of dyslexia has historically focused on specific areas of the brain. Study of brain anatomy of
dyslexics has been accomplished through postmortem analysis and through imaging techniques – MRI.
A significant contribution to understanding the neurobiology of dyslexia was made by Galaburda and
colleagues.

Galaburda (1985) and Humphreys (1990) studied brains of four male and three female deceased adults
with dyslexia. Two principal findings emerged from these autopsied brains:

A number of misplaced cells (ectopias) were found in all of the brains. Specifically these ectopias had
migrated to the outer layer of cortex, which is typically cell-free. They were found predominantly in the
left hemisphere in areas associated with language (the perisylvian language areas, the superior temporal
gyrus containing Wernicke’s area and the inferior premotor and prefrontal cortex containing Broca’s
area.

It has been hypothesized that these cells migrated beyond their intended destinations and quite possibly
formed atypical connections with other regions of the brain.

Another major finding of the post-mortem studies is the lack of asymmetry in the planum temporale in all
these brains. This asymmetry was not a result of a smaller left planum temporale but rather of a larger
right planum.

A most recent finding from the post-mortem studies revealed that dyslexic brains have smaller neurons
or a larger number of small neurons in the lateral geniculate nucleus (LGN) and medial geniculate
nucleus (MGN) of the thalamus. These nuclei connect to primary visual and auditory cortex, where
differences in neurons and patterns of cellular symmetry were also found (Galaburda and Rosen, 2001).
These thalamic changes could provide a neural explanation for some of the visual and auditory sensory
and perceptual difficulties that some researchers propose are – a deficit of dyslexia.

The development of MRI permitted comparisons of the images of the brains of living individuals with
and without dyslexia. Although the initial studies using MRI confirmed the results of the post-mortem
studies by Galaburda and colleagues, later studies were less conclusive. Hynd and Semrud-Clikeman
(1989) cited that variation in samples (age, sex, co-morbid pathology, and handedness) and in
measurement techniques as the possible source of these inconsistencies.

As researchers more carefully controlled sample characteristics, some interesting findings emerged.
Larsen, 1990 examined the planum temporale in 37 eighth-graders, including 19 carefully selected
dyslexic students and a strictly matched control group. In general, the students classified as dyslexic
showed symmetry in their plana. One particularly interesting finding was that the students with most
severe phonological decoding problems showed symmetry of the plana. Those students with dyslexia
who demonstrated the least phonological problems had asymmetrical plana.

Although the planum temporale has received the most attention in neuro-anatomical studies, other areas
of the brain have been studied, for ex: corpus callosum (Duara, 1991; Hynd, 1990) and the insula
(Pennington, 1999). However, results reporting the size and or symmetry of various structures have been
inconsistent.
 One recent direction has been to look at the pattern of sulci and gyri. Clark and plante (1998) found extra
sulci in a frontal area of individuals with developmental language disabilities. Leonard (1993; 2001)
found marked leftward asymmetry of the sylvian fissure in individuals with dyslexia. Hiemenz and Hynd
(2000) discovered that a specific sulcal morphology appears to be related to specific language abilities,
but was not directly related to a diagnosis of dyslexia. They emphasized the need to distinguish those
individuals with developmental dyslexia who have concurrent language delay from those who do not.
These studies have made the need to study clearly defined samples of individuals apparent.

writing

Introduction:

• The written form of language is the highest and the most complex form of communication. It is the last language
skill still to be learnt.

• Through writing, we integrate previous learning and experiences in listening, speaking and reading.

Written Expression

• Lack of facility in expressing ideas through writing is the most common disability seen in adults and children.

• Writing requires many related abilities such as ability in spoken language, ability to read, some skill in spelling,
legible handwriting, and knowledge of rules of written usage.

• Students with LD have significant problems in communicating through writing (Englert et al, 1988).

Writing communication in Integrated Language System

• Instruction in writing can improve performance in reading and instruction in reading can improve
performance in writing (Statsky, 1983).

• Writing, by its very nature is an active process. The physical aspect of writing literally forces active involvement
of writers.

• A writer performs actions of picking up pen or pencil (or using computer keyboard) and recording their
thoughts.

• During writing children must actively work at producing something that did not exist before by using their own
background knowledge and integrating their knowledge skills as they revise.

• Writing is a more self-involving task than reading since meaning of written message originates from within
writer and is known to writer in advance. Some authorities think that writing may be easier than reading and may
actually develop earlier (Chomsky 1979).
• Much reading occurs during process of writing. When adults write, over half of writing time is devoted to reading
activities (Stephens 1987). As soon as writers complete a section of writing, they usually read it. They also do it
to see how to connect a previously written section to one they are about to write.

• An integrated language approach that includes writing is beneficial even for primary age children (Martinz
& Trab 19870). When young children write, they explore both the functions and terms of written language.

• In their experience of writing, young children should not be required to adhere to criteria of proper form or
correct spelling. When children attempt to put their meaning into print they explore and learn about alphabetic
nature of written language.

Written language and learning disabilities

• Written language is considered one of the highest forms of language. Abilities and experiences in listening,
speaking and reading usually precede the development of writing skills.

• Difficulties in any of these other language areas will certainly interfere with the acquisition of the written form of
language (Johnson and Myklebust, 1967). Children with various reading problems invariably experience spelling
disabilities.

• Other factors related to written language disorders are (Myklebust, 1965; Brueckner and Bond, 1955):

• Spoken language disturbances.

• Auditory process problems (e.g. discrimination, memory, blending).

• Visual process problems (e.g. discrimination. memory, sequencing).

• Word analysis deficits, includes problems with phonics and syllabication.

• Speech articulation problems and other deviations and Instructional factors.

The Writing processes

• The process approach to writing emphasizes cognitive process, the writer engages during writing. Clinicians are
encouraged to understand complexity of writing task and to help clients in thinking, relating and organizing the
tasks required.

• Clients should ask themselves the following questions:

• What is the purpose of writing?

• How can I get ideas?

• How can I develop and organize ideas?

• How can I translate and revise ideas so that reader will understand them?
• The process of writing is cognitive, requires successive and progressive thinking. The first draft of piece of
writing is not for reader but for writer.

• As writer writes briefly down sentences and paragraphs, they give rise to new ideas or sometimes ways to revise
the ideas already written.

• At this stage there may be an overflow of ideas with little organization and consideration of grammar and
spelling.

• Subsequent drafts involve taking ideas of initial draft, organizing, and refining them whether the ideas will be
well communicated to intended reader. Amount of writing will depend on intended audience.

• Experts agree that writing is a learnt skill that can be taught in a school setting and that it should be taught as
thinking-learning activity. Instruction should emphasize the writing process (Graves 1985, 1983).

Stages of Writing Development

• Good writer do not simply sit down and produce a text but rather go through the several stages of writing
process (Graves 1985, 1987).

• Prewriting

• Writing

• Revising

• Sharing with audience.

Prewriting:

• During this stage writer gather ideas and refines them before formal writing begins. This involves a type of
brainstorming, such as talking through some thoughts and ideas, or developing an outline or list of main points
to be made.

Writing (or Drafting):

• Writer records ideas on paper. The term drafting could be used instead of writing to emphasize that this version of
what eventually will be written will be changed.

Revising:

• writer refines the drafted version of text. There can be several revisions, in which different kinds of changes are
made, such as content, the way of expressing the ideas, the vocabulary, the sentence structure and sequence of
ideas. The best revision is editing, which includes checking for grammatical punctuation and spelling errors.
Rewriting of earlier drafts is greatly facilitated by using microcomputers and word processors.

Sharing with an audience:

• This stage is important because it gives value and worth to entire writing process. It provide writer with the
opportunity to receive feedback and perceive themselves as authors responding to audience (Boss 1988).

• Types of written language disabilities:

• Handwriting has often been labeled the most concrete of all the basic academic skills (Wallace and McLoughlin,
1975).

• Handwriting deficits have been referred to as visual motor integration problems (Johnson & Myklebust, 1967) &
dysgraphia (Jorden, 1972).

1. Handwriting (penmanship) Assessment:

• a) Categories of error types (Mann, Suiter and McChung, 1987; Zaner Bloser, 1975).

• 1. Letter formation – It refers to the appropriateness of a written letter. Five categories of letter formation
(Gueron and Maier, 1983) are:

• i). Round letters:

a) Clockwise letters (e.g. k, p)

b) Counter clockwise letters (e.g. a, c, d, o, q)

• ii) Looped letters:

Above the line (e.g. b, d, e, f, h, k, l)

Below the line (e.g. g, j, p, q, y)

• iii) Retraced letters: (e.g. i, u, t, w, y)

• iv) Humped letters (e.g. h, m, n, v, x, z)

• v) Others (e.g. r, s)

2. Spacing errors – It refers to the way letters are distributed within words and to the ways words are spaced
within a phrase. It should be uniform e.g. within word spacing error; see the cat; between words spacing error:
see the catrun.

3. Slant errors – Both manuscript and cursive handwriting contain slant. It should be uniform. It can be assessed
by drawing a straight line through the letters. It then becomes apparent whether the letter posses uniform slant

4. Line quality – It refers to thickness/thinness of lines within a letter/between letters of word. Quality of line
should be uniform in the thickness and heaviness of produced letters.
 5. Letter size and alignment —i.e. the proper height and width of letters (size) and the proportion/relationship of
the size of letters within a given word (alignment) e.g. certain lower case letters are usually one quarter-inch high
(i, u, e); other letters are one half inch (e.g. i, h, k, d, t) and others are 3 quarters inch (e.g. i, h, k, b) lower loop
letters extend one half inch below the line.

6. Rate of handwriting – if it falls below an optimum speed, it will cause difficulties, rate of handwriting speed =
no. of letters/min (Zaner-Bloser, 1984).

The most common handwriting errors are (Jordan, Dale, R, 1972)

1. Difficulty with alphabet symbols:

• Does not remember how to write certain letters / numerals.

• Distorts shapes of certain letters or numerals.

• Overall writing effort is awkward, uneven.

• Has difficulty transferring from manuscript to cursive writing.

2. Confusion with directionality:

• Writes certain letters, numerals, or words in mirror image.

• Marks from bottom to top when forming certain letters/numerals.

• Uses backward (clockwise) motions when forming loops in certain letters/numerals.

• Erases/overprints habitually to change directions of certain letters/numerals.

• Writing tends to slant up, down or to wobble up and down.

3. Difficulty copying simple shapes:

• Distorts simple shapes, fails to close corners.

• Has difficulty producing simple designs from memory.

• Work deteriorates toward end of writing exercise.

• Has difficulty staying on lines when tracing.

• In addition to poor motor skills, handwriting problems may be due to inadequate visual perception ability or even
various motivational difficulties.

Pre-writing skills:
• It is a pre-requisite for mastering handwriting skills. Understandings of bodily relationships, such as up,
down, top and bottom, are included among, prewriting skills. The recognition and copying of different sizes and
shapes, correct pencil grasp, paper position and posture are other such skills.

• Kimmell (1970) suggests that a number of LD children have not had the experience of handling, twisting,
grasping, clutching, or squeezing objects in order to develop finer hand and finger muscles. The manipulation of
pencils/crayons is consequently both frustrating and difficult for these children.

Letter formation:

• It causes difficulty for many LD children. The addition, omission or reversal of certain letter strokes seems
particularly troublesome. Commonly reversed letters include b, d, p, q and y. Letters u and n are very frequently,
inverted. In general, letters are comprised of vertical, horizontal, or curved strokes.

• Most difficulties seem to occur in those letters in which straight lines & curves lines are combined (eg, h,r,f,b)
(Wallace & McLoughlin, 1975).

• Lewin & Lewis (1965) found that incorrect size was the most common type of manuscript error among first
grade children. Letters, which descend below the line (p, j, y, etc), were often printed in the wrong size.

Manuscript writing:

• Most schools initiate handwriting instruction with manuscript writing. the end of second grade or the
beginning of third grade, children are taught cursive writing. Irregular spacing of manuscript letters/words is seen
in some children. Many children have difficulty in remembering how to write certain letters. Letters with
simple strokes (e.g. I, t, l) are easier to remember than those with a number of different strokes (e.g., b, m, k).

• Many times letters are reversed because of left right orientation problems or simply because the child cannot
remember the correct position. Since most capital letters are not the larger version of lower case letters, it is
necessary to learn two manuscript forms of each letter.

Cursive writing:

• Children who experience extreme difficulties with manuscript will also experience failure with cursive writing
(Wallace and Kauffman, 1973, p.193).

• Some LD children do not conceptualize/visualize cursive writing as the printed form, which has been connected.
The child thinks of cursive writing as an entirely new writing system.

• The complex movements of cursive writing contribute to the difficulty of this writing style.The mechanics of
cursive writing require many intricate and precise movements, which require fine motor coordination.

Left-handedness:
• Left-handers assume a natural and comfortable writing position once the paper is slated opposite to the position
used by right-handed writers (Otto, McMenemy and Smith, 1973). This enables to see better, what they have
written and to avoid smudging. They also tend to have back slant of writing.

• A severe back slant suggests using manuscript writing instead of cursive for some children

Principles for teaching the writing processes:

Richek et al (1987) identifies several key principles for planning instruction in writing process.

1) The writing process requires much time, input and attention in prewriting stage.

2) The writing process frees the writer from over concentration and mechanics of writing.

3) Writing process helps writer to revise their work.

4) Avoids successive corrections of written work.

Assessment of written expression:

Many LD children are unable to utilize the written form of language as an effective means of communication.
Some are unable to transfer ideas to written communication, while others make grammar and syntax errors
(Myklebust, 1965).

Expression of ideas: Many children can orally express ideas but have inability to organize thoughts into the
proper/logical form for written communication. Some LD children who have had extensive and appropriate input
experiences but are still unable to communicate in writing.

* Syntax and grammar: Some of the more frequent written syntax errors are word omissions, distorted word
order, incorrect verb and pronoun usage, incorrect word endings and lack of punctuation (Myklebust, 1967). The
rules of grammar are also very confusing to many LD children. Learning the parts of speech, tenses and the rules
of usage is difficult for the child with memory/conceptualization deficits.

* Inadequate vocabulary leading to inadequate written expression: Some LD children have poor spoken and
written language vocabularies because of the lack of various experiences (eg. Reading books) or due to
impoverished oral language backgrounds.

Mechanics of writing: Capitalization, punctuation etc should be given less attention to avoid interference with
the basic objectives of improving written expression of ideas (Otto, McMenemy and Smith, 1973). Many LD
children are unable to identify correctly/utilize commas, question marks. Punctuation symbols are often confused
with each other/not used at all. Some of the difficulty that these children have with punctuations seems due to the
fact these marks are symbols and many LD children have symbolic disorders.

• The nature of writing (Graham, Harris, Mac ARTHUR AND Schwartz, 1991)

Cognitive processes in writing:

• - Flower and Hayes (1980) model” provides framework for describing cognitive processes involved in skilled
writing. It includes three main processes (they do not occur in linear order).

1. Planning: It involves three sub processes

• - Setting goals for writing, considering audience and topic - Generating content through systematic searching of
memories and external sources of information.

• - Organizing/framing text from the knowledge of text structure e.g. Letter to the editor should clearly state a
position, support the position with reasons, and refute opposing arguments (organizing and sequencing the ideas).

2. Text production: Includes physical process of writing, the production of correct sentence, and attention to
mechanics (composing sentences and attending to formal requirements of written language). These low-level
skills are automatic for experienced writers, whose large concern is planning, revising, and crafting text.

3. Reviewing: Includes evaluation and revision both of text already written down and of goals and ideas not
written yet. Skilled writers have a rich repertoire of criteria for evaluation and strategies for revising text. The
writer switches back and forth in the process among planning, drafting, and reviewing. Developing competence in
writing is a formidable task for any client.

The social context for writing:

• “See, I am writing this story about my trip to Florida. Moreover, I know my friends will like the part about the
dolphins because it is funny. So I’m telling a lot about that trying to make it funny.” (Jason)

• Purpose of writing – To communicate with others/ classmates

• Goals – To make story funny and to focus on dolphins

• Jason is planning the content

• His thinking as he plans and is writes is guided by social, communicative goals.

• Thus, writing is not only a cognitive process, but social process as well. We write to:

• Communicate our experiences, thoughts, feelings and ideas to other people.

• Make things happen to make requests/persuade others to take actions

• Experienced writers attempt to tailor their purposes, content, and language to their audience (Flower and Hayes,
1980)

Assessment of writing skills:

• Research informs us that the composing problems of students with LD go beyond mechanical ones such as
spelling, punctuation and grammar (Poteet, 1978; Houck and Billingsley, 1989) to include higher order cognitive
and metacognitive problems (Newcomer and Barenbraum, 1991) specifically, they lack knowledge of the writing
 process and metacognition about writing, such as what writing is about, its purpose and what constitutes a good
writer (Englert and Thomas 1987; Graham, Schwartx and MacArthur, 1993; Wong and Blenkinsop, 1989).

I. Formal assessment of writing/composing skills (by Pro-Ed publishers)

• 1. Test assessment of writing / composing (for elementary school student)

• 2. Test of adolescent language (TOAL) (for high school children)

1. Subtest of TOWL- 2 (By Hammill and Larsen, 1988)

• a. Contrived writing- specific component skills are assessed in isolation e.g. vocabulary, spelling, sentence
combination.

• b. Spontaneous writing – assesses student’s abilities to communicate meaningfully e.g. contextual vocabulary,
contextual spelling, and syntactic maturity.

2. Subtests of TOAL –2 (Hammil, Brown, Larsen and Wiederholt, 1980)

• a. Writing vocabulary – assess usage rather than its definition

• B. Writing Grammar assess usage of syntax in writing

3. Writing skills test (Thomas, 1961): For grades from 9 to 12. It measures vocabulary sentence recognition,
grammar punctuation and mechanics, spelling and sentence building.

• Picture story language test ( Myklebust, 1965) : Assesses writing development, age range 7 to 17, stimulus
picture, instruction write story. It measures length (productivity), correctness of expression (Syntax), content/
meaning (abstract/ concrete).

II. Informal assessment of writing: Procedure

• a) Present the student with 5-8 pictures of his/ her hobby. Ask him to choose one of the pictures about which he is
writing a paragraph of eight sentences.

• b) In analyzing his writings, note the following

• Disproportionate amount of time taken to produce the desired amount of writing.

• Monotonous and unvarying format of the sentences

• Paucity of vocabulary

• Poor spelling

• Occasional grammatical and punctuation errors

• Ambiguous sentences / parts of sentences.

 Tests (Age/grade assessed)

Informal tests

• Assessment of written expression (Grades 2-12)

• Inventory of written expression and spelling- revised (Grades 2-12)

Formal Tests

• Picture story language test-Revised(Age 7-11 yrs)

• Test of adolescent language (Grades 1-12)

• Test of written language (TOWL) (Grades 2-12)

• Woodlock- Johnson Psychoeducational battery, Testa of achievements (Age 9-18 yrs)

Teaching Strategies:

• Many clients including LD reach upper elementary or secondary levels with little exposure to and little
experience with written expression.

• It is important to provide abundant time and opportunities for various kinds of writing, using
strategies given below:

Instruction in writing process:

• Boss (1978) suggests that there are six approaches to teach writing process to LD students:

• Provide opportunity for sustained writing; It is extremely important to give writers sufficient time to think, reflect
write and rewrite. Many individuals with LD spend less than 10 mins per day composing. Boss recommends that
this be extended to 50 mins per day 4 days per wk.

• Establish a writing community: Atmosphere of writing in training should foster writing activities and encourage
co-operative work.

• Let the clients choose their topic: Writing projects are most successful when clients have personal interest in
subject. If they need more information, reading materials and other sources should be readily available.

• Model the writing process and strategic thinking: Clinician and peer modeling of cognitive process involved in
writing is helpful. For e.g. clinician might think aloud to model writing stages.

• Develop reflective thinking and sense of audience. Transfer ownership and control of writing to clients.

• Motivation through grading: Avoid discouraging clients through grading procedures. The clinician might grade
only ideas, not technical form, for some assignments, or give 2 grades one for ideas and one for technical skills.
 For clients who make errors in many areas the clinician might select only one skill at a time for correction such as
capitalization.

• Personal and functional writing: It is useful to differentiate between personal and functional writing lessons. In
personal writing, the goal is to develop ideas and express them in written form. The process rather than output is
important and there is less need for technical perfection. The goal of functional writing is to leave the form of
output.

• Providing abundant input: Clients need something to write about. Before asking them to write make sure that
they have enough firsthand experience, such as trips, creative activities, television shows, movies and sports
events that can be exploited for writing material.

• Frequent writing: This has been recommended as being helpful in developing written expression skills. Fader &
Shwartz (1966) found that assignment to write certain number of pages per week in a book was uncorrected and
even unread by clinician was an excellent technique to provide needed practice and to improve the quality of
writing.

• The Cloze procedure: This method can be used to teach written expression, writing a sentence with words
deleted in between so that writer can insert as many as possible words. E.g. John ____ the ball.

• Combining sentences: This is especially useful for adolescents and adults. The student must combine those
sentences into more complex sentence by adding clauses and connectors.

Strategies for using word processing:

• Below are some suggested activities for using computer word processing to teach writing.

• Practicing vocabulary words: Write a series of sentences with blank lines for vocabulary words the client is
studying. Place the vocabulary words at the bottom of the page. Using the ‘move’ function select the correct word
and move them to each sentences.

• Learning story sequence: Place several sentences above a series of events in incorrect order and have the client
use move function to put them in proper sequence.

• Building vocabulary: Have clients use ‘find’ and ‘replace’ functions to find overused words such as very, nice and
substitute other appropriate words.

Beginning a story:

• Diary or Journal: Keeping a diary of daily events has proved to be an effective technique for improving reading
and writing skills. Instead of writing on paper, the client can use a word processor. It offers a new perspective and
fresh motivation for writing.
• Sending electronic mail: students can send 3 types of messages with computer- personal, semi personal and class
messages such as announcements and assignments. The messages can be sent between clients or between the
clinician and client.

Metalinguistic Skills
Acquiring language skills involves phonological, semantic, morphological/ syntactic and pragmatic
development. Knowing a language doesn’t necessitate an ability to understand the underlying principles
of the system.

Metalinguistic skills are needed to understand language. Metalinguistic skills refer to the ability to think
about, and to reflect on language.

Noam Chomsky defines the field of Metalinguistics as the subject’s knowledge of the characteristics and
functioning of language or, from a functionalist perspective, of its functioning and its usage.

Phonological awareness is a critical metalinguistic skill. Phonological awareness is unique for learning to
read an alphabetic language. Phonological awareness refers to the general ability to attend to or
manipulate the sounds of language
Phonological segmentation & blending skills play a key role in the development of reading

Frith, 1985 – poor phonological awareness at the level of phoneme may hinder the acquisition of the
alphabetic principle

Phonological deficit hypothesis:

 Reduced phonological awareness is associated with impaired reading skills is that poor
phonological skills lead directly to poor reading
 The phonological deficit hypothesis – spelling to sound translation ability will be selectively
impaired in dyslexia – 2 predictions(Brown, 1997)
1. Non-word reading selectively impaired in dyslexia (has good evidences)
2. Reduced effects of spelling to sound regularity in dyslexia (has poor evidence)
Children who are poor in phonological awareness generally show poor reading ability and vice versa
(Sowling et al., 1995)

Even many adult dyslexics continue to experience difficulties in performing successfully on tasks
assessing phonological abilities (Bruck., et al, 1990, 1992)

Stainthorp & Hughes, 1998 have shown that a group of 5 year old precocious readers, defined as those
who read fluently prior to school instruction, had significantly higher scores at shallow intermediate and
deep levels of phonological sensitivity than non-reading children matched for verbal IQ

Phonological recoding ad dyslexia:

Seymour, 1987 noted “ A standard proposal is that the contribution of phonemic segmentation might be
mediated in the establishment of a system of grapheme-phoneme correspondence.
Dyslexics find difficulty in grapheme-phoneme conversion rules

Phonological recoding deficits is the source of the word reading difficulties in dyslexics ( Rack, Snowling,
& olson, 1992)

It also leads to the persistent non-word reading deficit in dyslexia ( Be-Drol, Pollatsek & Scarpetin, 1991)

In reading development – phonological recoding strategy used – to read regular words as well as no-
words

It ultimately points out that impaired phonological recoding means impaired phonological awareness

Phonological representation ad segmentation:

Phonological awareness tasks reflects the quality of the phonological representations that are used in
clearing to read and in other speech based functions such as object naming (Hulme & Snowling 1992 ,
Swan & Goswami 1997)

Dyslexics who are phonologically impaired show weak, insecure or indistinct phonological
representation of words (Elbro 1996, Snowling & Hulme 1994) and difficulty in segmenting speech
sounds at one or other level (Syllable phoneme onset time) and mapping these segments onto the
relevant visual symbols

In picture naming tasks Dyslexic children show weak phonological representations and poor
segmentation abilities ( Swan & Goswami, 1997 a , 1997 b)

Input phonological difficulties may lead to delayed acquisition of letter-sound correspondence rules
(Snowling, 1987)

Output phonological difficulties may result in restricted processing stage-coding- letter strings and may
impair phonemic bending

Problems in phoneme segmentations may ultimately results in spelling problems

Phonological awareness and verbal memory:

Problems in verbal memory have been found in may studies of Dyslexia ( Mc Doughal, Steger, Harding &
Philips, 1975, Snowling, 1996….)

The memory deficit appears to be specific to tasks that require phonological processes (Share, 1995)

Is there a connection between poor phonological processing and verbal memory?

Yes, Memory problems contribute to difficulties in holding individual phonemes in mind as part of
phonic reading strategy

Memory span correlates with non-word reading scores and better than with measures of
comprehension (Sielgel & Ryan, 1988)
Phonological representations at segmental level of the syllable may be less easily applied to the recovery
of novel stimuli during memory tasks than those which are specified at a phonemic level (Fowler, 1991)

The difference in memory span between good and poor readers is linked to poor phonological
processing is supported by two main findings

1. The difference is found only for verbal stimuli or those that can be easily verbally encoded and
not for visuo-spatial material ( Mc Doughal, et al., 1994; Swanson, Ashbaker, & Lee, 1996)
2. The good readers appear to be more susceptible to acoustic (phonological) confusion effects
)than poor readers (Brady, Shankwieler, & Mann, 1983 ; Mann, Liberman, 1980)
Reading & Non-word repetition:

Speech-related difficulty for children with reading problems relates to the repetition of non-words(
Stone & Brady, 1995)

Snowling was the first to show that the ability to correctly repeat non-words differentiates good and
poor readers matches for reading age

Gathercole has considered this as phonological short term memory task

Gathercole et al.,1992, 1994 b, 1995 - reported significant relationships between non-word repetition
performance and reading by unimpaired readers as well as others.

There is also some debate whether the above test is primarily a measure of phonemic segmentation and
blending variability or of memory (Sowling, willis & Baddeley, 1991, Bowey & Hulme, 1996a, 1997)

Muter & Snowling (1998) reported “ Non-word repetition has bee most usually conceptualized as a
measure of phonological working memory

However, the non-word repetition correlated with phoneme deletion at age 9 suggests that it should
not be construed purely as a memory test but rather a measure sensitive to the integrity of phonological
representations

The working memory model

The notion of phonological loop component of so-called working memory model has been widely
adopted to explain a variety of effects in memory research (Baddeley, 1986, 1990,; Gathercole & Martin,
1996)

The loop is said to consist of 2 components

1. A time-limited (rapid decaying) acoustic core

2. A rehearsal mechanism that is used to refresh items in the store
Rehearsal is thought to be conducted using sub-vocal speech.
The faster the covert or sub-vocal speech rate, the greater the number of items that can be maintained
in a articulatory rehearsal loop or acoustic store within working memory. Those with faster articulation
will have longer spans

The differences in rehearsal rate between dyslexics and control readers, as between younger and older
children. ( Hitch ad Haliday, 1983)

Evaluation of dyslexia

1.The Test of Word Reading Efficiency (TOWRE)

• It is a nationally normed measure of word reading accuracy and fluency.

• It can be administered very quickly, the test provides an efficient means of monitoring the
growth of two kinds of word reading skills that are critical in the development of over all reading
ability: the ability to accurately recognize familiar words as whole units or "sight words" and the
ability to "sound out" words quickly.

• Administration: Individual
Testing Time: 5-10 minutes

• Ages / Grades: Ages: 6-0 through 24-11

Contains two subtests

• The Test of Word Reading Efficiency contains two subtests:

• The Sight Word efficiency (SWE) subtest: assesses the number of real printed words that can be
accurately identified within 45 seconds.

• The Phonetic decoding efficiency (PDE) subtest: measures the number of pronounceable
printed non words that can be accurately decoded within 45 seconds.

• Each subtest has two forms (Forms A and B) that are of equivalent difficulty, and either one or
both forms of each subtest may be given depending upon the purposes of the assessment.

• Percentiles, standard scores, and age and grade equivalents are provided.

• subtest standard scores have a mean of 100 and a standard deviation of 15.

• Age and grade equivalents show the relative standing of individual's scores.

• Reliability of the (TOWRE) was investigated using estimates of content sampling, time sampling,
and scorer differences.

2. The Dibels Nonsense Word Fluency(NWF)

Given by Good and Kaminski in 2002.

The NWF measure takes about 2 minutes to administer.

• The Dibels Nonsense Word Fluency(NWF) is a standardized, individually administered test of the
alphabetic principle - including letter-sound correspondence in which letters represent their
most common sounds and of the ability to blend letters into words in which letters represent
their most common sounds .

• The student is presented an 8.5" x 11" sheet of paper with randomly ordered VC and
CVC Nonsense words (e.g., sig, rav, ov) and asked to produce verbally the individual letter sound
of each letter or verbally produce, or read, the whole Nonsense word.

• For example, if the stimulus word is "vaj" the student could say /v/ /a/ /j/ or say the word /vaj/
to obtain a total of three letter-sounds correct. The student is allowed 1 minute to produce as
many letter-sounds as he/she can, and the final score is the number of letter-sounds produced
correctly in one minute.

• Because the measure is fluency based, students should receive a higher score if they are
phonologically recoding the word, as they will be more efficiently producing the letter sounds,
and receive a lower score if they are providing letter sounds in isolation.

• The intent of this measure is that students are able to read unfamiliar words as whole words,
not just name letter sounds as fast as they can.

• Administration and Scoring Procedures for the NWF Measure

Sample NWF Probes:----------------

SCORING PROCEDURES

• Discontinue Rule: If a student does not get any sounds correct in the first 5 words, discontinue
the task and record a score of zero (0).

• Correct letter sounds: Underline the individual letters for letter sounds produced correctly in
isolation and score 1 point for each letter sound produced correctly. For example, if the
stimulus word is "tob" and the students says /t/ /o/ /b/, the individual letters would be
underlined with a score of 3.

• Correct words:. Use a single line under multiple letters for correct letter sounds blended
together, and give credit for each letter sound correspondence produced correctly. For example,
if the stimulus word is "tob" and the students says "tob", one underline would be used with a
score of 3.

• Partially Correct Responses: If a word is partially correct, underline the corresponding letters for
letter sounds produced correctly. Put a slash (/) through the letter if the corresponding letter
sound is incorrect. For example, if the word is "tob" and the student says "toab" (with a long o),
the letters "t" and "b" would be underlined, and the letter "o" would be slashed with a score of
2.

• Self-corrections: If a student makes an error and corrects him/herself within 3 seconds, write
"SC" above the letter and count it as correct.

• Reference: Early reading assessment: a Practioner's handbook by Natalie Rathvon.

3.Woodcock Reading Mastery Test - Revised (WRMT-R)

Given by Woodcock in 1998.

• Administered for age of 5 to 75 yrs.

• Time taken :45 minutes

• The Woodcock Reading Mastery Test – Revised (WRMT-R) is a commonly used educational
achievement test .The WRMT-R has two forms and includes several subtests.

• Letter Identification. Children are required to name a random selection of upper and lower case
letters that are written in a variety of fonts.

• Word Identification. Children are required to read words in a list format aloud. They have five
seconds to identify each word before they are prompted to move on to the next word.

• Nonsense Words. Children are required to read words that are not real. Nonsense words allow
the evaluator to determine how the child recognizes words without using compensatory
strategies (i.e., looking at pictures, guessing based upon context, or reading words by sight).
 Children have five seconds to respond before they are prompted for a response, and then
moved on to the next word.

• Word Comprehension. This subtest has three sections: antonyms (word opposites), synonyms
(words with the same meaning), and analogies (up is to down as slow is to fast).

• Children have fifteen seconds before they are prompted for a response, and then moved on to
the next item. Children who have weaknesses in word finding or word retrieval may have
difficulty with this task.

• Passage Comprehension. Children are required to read passages to themselves, then fill in the
blanks to demonstrate their understanding.

• This type of reading comprehension test can be challenging for children with expressive
language disorders. The fill-in-the-blank format requires a precise understanding of sentence
structure and grammar, and the ability to retrieve the exact word needed.
Children have approximately thirty seconds after reading the passage to respond.

Intervention
Self esteem and motivation

• The Language of Success

Signal confidence in their ability to succeed

‘I know you can…’You are really good at this……

• The Language of Hope

Create an ethos where it’s ok to try and ask for help

‘You can do it…’ ‘What helps you do it?’ Inserting the word yet.

• The Language of Possibility

Reduce limiting statements such as, ‘I always get it wrong.’

‘Yes, you were a bit confused but let’s see which bit is causing you problems…’

MOSS Multi sensory, 0ver learned, Structured, Sequential.

The key feature of multisensory teaching is to involve input from visual, auditory, oral, tactile
and kinaesthetic channels

Presenting Written Information

 Use off-white coloured paper

Use a minimum of 14pt text

Use rounded fonts such as Arial, Tahoma

Keep lines left justified with a ragged right edge

Use line spacing to break up text

Use wide margins and headings. Highlight margins.

Use bold to highlight (not italics or underlining)

Use bullet points instead of numbered lists

Write clear, concise sentences and instructions

Use flow charts to represent information visually

Strategies that can be used

• Teach the child to develop own strategies:

 Teach the child to relax with breathing exercises or mental imagery

 Initially encourage the child to participate and practice in a group

 Teach self – reinforcing stratagies

 Let the child practice the skill with a friend before facng the real situation.

 Let the child record and analyze and correct mistakes.

Didactic approach:

Behaviors are learned and acquired through reinforcement: behaviors which are not reinforced,
will be extinguished. Behaviors are learned through observation of positive social interactions.

 Massed trials on specific targets.

 High rate of reward.

 One-to-one teaching in a distraction- free environment.

 Agent of change is the therapist/trainer.

Milieu approaches (incidental teaching)

 Intervention takes place in everyday, environments, as part of social interaction.

 Agents of change are the usual interactive partners: parents, teachers, care staff.

 Features of child directed language are built into the programme,since these are
assumed to facilitate language development. Eg: response to spontaneous attempts to
communicate.

 Arrange environment to to increase the probability that a particular comuicative functio

will be used.

 Respond to the childs focus of intrest if at all possible.

 Select language targets slightly in advance of childs current level of competence.

 Ensure joint attention.

 Use a hierarchy of prompts to ecourage the child to produce the more developmentally
advanced form.

 Respond with re-inforcers that are naturally linked to the target i.e., appropriate to the
social interaction.

Phoneme training:

 This is done to teach a child speech-to-script skills. This may be especially required while
teaching languages like english where there is no one-to-one correlation between the
script and the phoneme.

 Steps that can be used in phonemic synthesis are as follows:

 Training for phonemic synthesis:

Step -1; letters

Make flash cards of all the letters of the english alphabet (A – Z). It would be preferable to make
the letter associated with the sounds by having the word pictographically represented.

• For e.g.: A- Ant or apple ->(pic of apple)

The first sound of the word should indicate the sound of the letter (A-> ae -> /aent/).

Step 2:
The first instruction to be given to the child is the distinction between the name of a letter and
its sound. Each letter of the english alphabet has a name and a sound.

• For e.g.,

• ”a” is its name and /ae/ as in ant, is its sound.

• “b” is its name and /b/ as in ball is its sound.

Step 3:

Write a letter of the alphabet on a flash card with a picture representing the letter drawn on
the reverse side. Initially the picture can be shown and the child has to produse the first sound
of the picture.

• For e.g:

/ae/ when they see an apple

/b/ when they see a ball

Gradually when the child is familiar with the sounds of the letters, they may associate the
sound with only the letter, without the word.

For e.g.:

/ae/ when they see an A

/b/ when they see B.

• Step 4: digraphs

• In this step, consonant digraphs may be introduced.

• These are /sh/ (shoe), /ch/ (chew), /th/ (thumb), /th/ (the), /ph/ (phone) and /wh/
(what). These sounds are also taught in the same way.

• Step 5: short vowels:

• In the step introduse the vowels with their names a,e,I,o,u. the sounds that have been
taught to them should be itroduced

• as their short sounds. They also have long sounds that shall be learnt about later.

• Step 6: consonant blends:

 • When the sounds are correctly identified more than 90% of the time, move on to the
next step of consonant blends. The method of teaching is the same as before with the
use of flash cards.

• Step 7: long vowels

• Initially, introduce short vowels and then introduce the long sound of the vowels.

• The long sound of a vowel is nothing but the name of the vowel. (i.e., when the name
itself forms the sound of a vowel in a word, it is a long vowel).

Missing word exercise:

The person is expected to guess the missing word in a message. Initially it is done using
familiar material such as rhymes for children or idioms for adults.

• gradually material that no difficult may be used this would include asking the person to
name a word that rhymes with S

A particular word e.g. “an animal that rhymes with the word.” later the person could be asked
to predict the missing word in an unfamiliar sentence.

e.g. “as it was raining, I brought my……”

Missing syllable exercise:

This task is done once the person is able to predict a missing word based on a context.

As with the missing word task, this also proceeds from least difficult task to the more difficult
task.

• Initially the final syllable should be omitted, followed by the medial and then the initial
syllable.

• At each step only a part of the word should be deleted. This word could be embedded in
a sentence or a cue about the word could be given.

• e.g. “ The boy ate a ba…..;transport ; rail

Missing phoneme exercise:

The activity is similar to the above except a specific phoneme is deleted. Initially it may be
done for a word embedded in a sentence and later in a isolated word, with the general category
known, E.g. I want to eat a (b)anana; Food: tomato(o).
Compensatory training:

Many children with short-term memory deficits learn to use compensatory strategies
incidentally.