Educational attainment in poor comprehenders

Reading profiles in secondary school: concurrent language and cognitive abilities, and retrospective and prospective reading skills

Introduction

We examined the concurrent language and cognitive abilities in a group of Swedish students with different reading profiles in secondary school, and the retrospective (primary school) and prospective (upper-secondary school) reading skills of each reading profile.

Methods

Seventy-nine students participated in data collections in primary (grade 2: age 8), secondary (grade 8: age 14) and upper-secondary school (year 2: age 17). Independent variables included measures of word recognition, and vocabulary and text comprehension in secondary school. Dependent variables included measures of phonemic awareness, verbal fluency, listening comprehension, spelling, verbal working memory and nonverbal reasoning skills in secondary school, and word recognition and reading comprehension in primary and upper-secondary school.

Results

When exploring the concurrent language and cognitive abilities of the reading profiles in secondary school, spelling emerged as a weakness and listening comprehension as a strength for students with poor decoding. Students with poor comprehension experienced weaknesses in spelling, and non-verbal reasoning. Students with both poor decoding and comprehension displayed a multi-deficit profile in language and cognition. As regards the retrospective and prospective reading skills, the relative ranking of the reading profiles was rather consistent in both primary and upper-secondary school.

Discussion

The findings suggest that limitations in phonological awareness may not be a prominent feature of secondary school students with poor decoding in more transparent orthographies. From an educational perspective, spoken sources may support learning among students with poor decoding, whereas students with poor comprehension or combined difficulties in decoding and comprehension need support when learning from both spoken and written sources.

Bioenvironmental Predictors of Childhood Reading and Speech Difficulties

PURPOSE

Reading and speech difficulties are common in childhood, yet it is not fully understood how much of their etiology is shared. This partly derives from methodological issues related to overlooking the potential co-occurrence between the two sets of difficulties. This study investigated the effects of five bioenvironmental predictors in a sample assessed for such co-occurrence.

METHOD

A combination of exploratory and confirmatory analyses was performed on longitudinal data from the National Child Development Study. Exploratory latent class analysis was performed on children's reading, speech, and language outcomes at ages 7 and 11 years. Membership in the obtained classes was modeled using a regression with sex and four early-life predictors: gestation period, socioeconomic status, maternal education, and the home reading environment.

RESULTS

The model yielded four latent classes that broadly reflected (1) average reading and speech, (2) excellent reading, (3) reading difficulties, and (4) speech difficulties. Early-life factors significantly predicted class membership. Male sex and preterm birth emerged as risk factors for both reading and speech difficulties. Protective effects against reading difficulties were identified for maternal education, and lower (but not higher) levels of socioeconomic status and the home reading environment.

CONCLUSIONS

Co-occurrence of reading and speech difficulties in the sample was low, and differential patterns of effect of the social environment were supported. Reading outcomes were under stronger malleable influence than speech outcomes.

Receptive and expressive vocabulary development in children learning English as an additional language: Converging evidence from multiple datasets

Children learning English as an additional language (EAL) are a diverse and growing group of pupils in England's schools. Relative to their monolingual (ML) peers, these children tend to show lower receptive and expressive vocabulary knowledge in English, although interpretation of findings is limited by small and heterogeneous samples. In an effort to increase representativeness and power, the present study combined published and unpublished datasets from six cross-sectional and four longitudinal studies investigating the vocabulary development of 434 EAL learners and 342 ML peers (age range: 4;9-11;5) in 42 primary schools. Multilevel modelling confirmed previous findings of significantly lower English vocabulary scores of EAL learners and some degree of convergence in receptive but not expressive knowledge by the end of primary school. Evidence for narrowing of the gap in receptive knowledge was found only in datasets spanning a longer developmental period, hinting at the protracted nature of this convergence.

Sleep-disordered breathing and daytime sleepiness predict children's reading ability

BACKGROUND

Sleep problems are common in children and are known to detrimentally affect language and cognitive abilities, as well as academic achievement.

AIMS

We aimed to investigate effects of sleep on oral word and non-word reading in a large, cross-sectional sample of children.

SAMPLE

Of 428 children who attended a public psychological science event, 339 children aged 4-14 years (mean 8;10 ± 2;2) took part.

METHODS

Parents completed two sleep questionnaires (Children's Sleep Habits Questionnaire and Sleep-Disordered Breathing Questionnaire) whilst children completed the Test of Word Reading Efficiency.

RESULTS

Hierarchical multiple linear regression assessed whether parentally reported sleep problems were able to predict word and non-word oral reading speeds as measures of sight word reading and phonemic decoding efficiency, respectively. Children with parent-reported increased sleep-disordered breathing, daytime sleepiness, and shorter sleep latency had poorer performance on the reading task for both words and non-words, as well as the total combined score. The models explained 6-7% of the variance in reading scores.

CONCLUSIONS

This study illustrates associations between sleep and word and non-word reading. The small but significant effect is clinically meaningful, especially since adverse factors affecting children's reading ability are cumulative. Thus, for children with multiple risk factors for poor reading ability, sleep problems may be another avenue for treatment. Since reading ability is a strong predictor of later academic success and life outcomes, our study provides important evidence to suggest that children with sleep problems should also be screened for literacy difficulties, and children with literacy difficulties be screened for sleep problems.

Primary school teachers' readiness in identifying children with dyslexia: A national survey in Sri Lanka

Primary school teachers should be able to identify struggling learners who may have dyslexia type learning difficulties, in order to facilitate early intervention. Considering this importance, a nationwide survey was conducted in Sri Lanka with 705 primary school teachers among randomly selected schools in order to investigate teacher readiness to identify learners with dyslexia. Teacher readiness was measured based on three variables (a) teachers' self-reported basic knowledge of dyslexia, (b) their self-reported awareness of local tools and processes used to identify dyslexia and (c) their self-reported attitudes towards engaging in identifying dyslexia. Data were gathered through a structured questionnaire. Logistic regression analyses revealed that the participants had minimal readiness to engage in identifying learners with dyslexia. However, most of them showed positive attitudes towards actively engaging in identifying dyslexia.

Sleep-dependent consolidation in children with comprehension and vocabulary weaknesses: it'll be alright on the night?

BACKGROUND

Vocabulary is crucial for an array of life outcomes and is frequently impaired in developmental disorders. Notably, 'poor comprehenders' (children with reading comprehension deficits but intact word reading) often have vocabulary deficits, but underlying mechanisms remain unclear. Prior research suggests intact encoding but difficulties consolidating new word knowledge. We test the hypothesis that poor comprehenders' sleep-associated vocabulary consolidation is compromised by their impoverished lexical-semantic knowledge.

METHODS

Memory for new words was tracked across wake and sleep to assess encoding and consolidation in 8-to-12-year-old good and poor comprehenders. Each child participated in two sets of sessions, one beginning in the morning (AM-encoding) and the other in the evening (PM-encoding). In each case, they were taught 12 words and were trained on a spatial memory task. Memory was assessed immediately, 12- and 24-hr later via stem-completion, picture-naming, and definition tasks to probe different aspects of word knowledge. Long-term retention was assessed 1-2 months later.

RESULTS

Recall of word-forms improved over sleep and postsleep wake, as measured in both stem-completion and picture-naming tasks. Counter to hypotheses, deficits for poor comprehenders were not observed in consolidation but instead were seen across measures and throughout testing, suggesting a deficit from encoding. Variability in vocabulary knowledge across the whole sample predicted sleep-associated consolidation, but only when words were learned early in the day and not when sleep followed soon after learning.

CONCLUSIONS

Poor comprehenders showed weaker memory for new words than good comprehenders, but sleep-associated consolidation benefits were comparable between groups. Sleeping soon after learning had long-lasting benefits for memory and may be especially beneficial for children with weaker vocabulary. These results provide new insights into the breadth of poor comprehenders' vocabulary weaknesses, and ways in which learning might be better timed to remediate vocabulary difficulties.

Early Identification of Dyslexia: Understanding the Issues

Purpose

The purpose of this tutorial is to provide an overview of the benefits and challenges associated with the early identification of dyslexia.

Method

The literature on the early identification of dyslexia is reviewed. Theoretical arguments and research evidence are summarized. An overview of response to intervention as a method of early identification is provided, and the benefits and challenges associated with it are discussed. Finally, the role of speech-language pathologists in the early identification process is addressed.

Conclusions

Early identification of dyslexia is crucial to ensure that children are able to maximize their educational potential, and speech-language pathologists are well placed to play a role in this process. However, early identification alone is not sufficient—difficulties with reading may persist or become apparent later in schooling. Therefore, continuing progress monitoring and access to suitable intervention programs are essential.

The Comprehension Problems of Children with Poor Reading Comprehension despite Adequate Decoding: A Meta-Analysis

The purpose of this meta-analysis was to examine the comprehension problems of children who have a specific reading comprehension deficit (SCD), which is characterized by poor reading comprehension despite adequate decoding. The meta-analysis included 86 studies of children with SCD who were assessed in reading comprehension and oral language (vocabulary, listening comprehension, storytelling ability, and semantic and syntactic knowledge). Results indicated that children with SCD had deficits in oral language (d = -0.78, 95% CI [-0.89, -0.68], but these deficits were not as severe as their deficit in reading comprehension (d = -2.78, 95% CI [-3.01, -2.54]). When compared to reading comprehension age-matched normal readers, the oral language skills of the two groups were comparable (d = 0.32, 95% CI [-0.49, 1.14]), which suggests that the oral language weaknesses of children with SCD represent a developmental delay rather than developmental deviance. Theoretical and practical implications of these findings are discussed.

Reading Fluency As a Predictor of School Outcomes across Grades 4-9

This study analyzed the predictive relationship between reading fluency and school outcomes across school levels (primary, secondary, and high school), after controlling on the effect of reading comprehension. The sample included 489 children attending Italian primary (grades 4 and 5), secondary (grades 6 and 8), and high schools (grade 9). Students' reading fluency and comprehension were examined with a standardized reading achievement test. At the end of the school year, we requested the school reports of each participant. According to our data, reading fluency predicted all school marks in all literacy-based subjects, with reading rapidity being the most important predictor. School level did not moderate the relationship between reading fluency and school outcomes, confirming the importance of effortless and automatized reading even in higher school levels. Overall this study emphasizes the importance of identifying evidence-based tasks that can be administered in a short time and to many different individuals, which are easy to create, and are linked to school outcomes.