Dyslexic Children with Specific Learning Difficulties - Essay Example

Dyslexic children with specific learning difficulties: an analysis Introduction Dyslexia is a learning disorder that shows itself as a difficulty of reading, spelling and in some cases mathematics. Reading difficulties resulting from other causes, such as a non-neurological and deficiency with vision or hearing, or from poor reading instruction. Dyslexia is suspect to be the result of a neurological defect and though not sound disability and it is diagnosed in people of all levels of intelligence. Even though there are many definitions available for the disorder called dyslexia, it is important to refer to the definition of “The World Federation of Neurology’: “Specific developmental dyslexia is a disorder manifested by difficulty learning to read despite conventional instruction, adequate intelligence, and adequate socio-cultural opportunity. It is dependent upon fundamental cognitive disabilities that are frequently of constitutional origin.” (Ariniello, 1999). Through this proposal it is hoped to analyze the learning disabilities of children such as reading, writing and spelling errors such as, mirror writing, back forward writing and so on. It is hoped to identify the link between these abilities (Alexander, & Slinger-Constant, 2004). That is how specific learning disabilities have an impact on other factors such as social factors, psychological factors or environmental factors and so on. Reading and learning are the two factors that decide the success of a child during his school career. Initially he learns to read. After that he reads to learn (Griffiths, & Snowling, 2002). As such reading is of paramount importance in the educational process. Unfortunately poor reading skills, and as a result poor learning skills, have become a stark reality for a disturbing number of children. The Institute for Global Education and Service Learning states that 40% of American children have difficulty reading or learning to read, and as many as three-quarters of pupils who are poor readers in third grade will remain poor readers in high school. The word "dyslexia" is frequently used to refer to the child who has an average or above average IQ and is reading 1 1/2 grades or more below grade level and whose reading problem is accompanied by the signs such as: Reversals of letters (Carrol, & Iles, 2006). That is children with dyslexia frequently confuse letters like b and d, either when reading or when writing, or they sometimes read (or write) words like "rat" for "tar," or "won" for "now." 1.1. Research Questions What is the relationship between reading, writing and spelling disabilities of the dyslexic children and other factors: the social factors, psychological factors or environmental factors and so on? What’s the nature and extent of the impact of child’s strengths/ difficulties on the primarily and immediately relevant aspects of studies? How does dyslexic children adapt to the new environment and what are the planned programs that would be better in order to minimize the dyslexic children’s errors? 1.2. Hypothesis or Thesis statement The primacy and immediacy of a priori and a posteriori implications of dyslexia among school children have been subject to a wider perspective-based research effort over the years despite the woeful inadequacy of analytical approaches to the decisive elements in subsequent intervention programs at the school and societal level. Dyslexic children with specific learning difficulties is of critical significance to this study, inadequate knowledge of probable outcomes in the process of societal interaction is also of equal significance to the whole exercise. Convergence/divergence behavioral tendencies among the school children would be cited adequately to support the hypothetical learning outcomes. 2. Literature review Developmental Dyslexia (DD) has been defined as “evident when accurate and fluent word reading and/or spelling develops incompletely or with great difficulty” by the British Psychological Society (BPS) (Moody, 2006). It goes on to describe it as “This focuses on literacy at the word level and implies that the problem is severe and persistent despite appropriate learning opportunities. It provides the basis of a staged process of assessment through learning” (BPS, 1999). This definition is rather a functional one with focus on the subject’s reading or spelling impairment and extends to include a reference to the provision of adequate or reasonable learning opportunities to the dyslexic, so that there is not a conscious or unconscious process of exclusion (Habib, Frith, & Frith, 2001). On the other hand the International Dyslexia Board (IDB) and the US National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) adopt the following definition: “Developmental Dyslexia is a specific learning disability that is neurological in origin. It is characterized by difficulties with accurate or/and fluent word recognition and by poor spelling and decoding abilities (Chivers, 2000). These difficulties typically result from a deficit in the phonological component of the language that is often unexpected in relation to other cognitive abilities and the provision of effective classroom instruction. Secondary consequences may include problems in reading comprehension and reduced reading experience that can impede growth of vocabulary and background knowledge”, (www.nichd.nih.gov). This definition is technically elaborate enough to serve as a seminal proposition to enable further analysis of the subject (Habib, 2000). Though it places emphasis on neurological aspects of the disorder, it has the necessary characteristics to capture more of the associated connotations and denotations of Dyslexia. Dyslexia is suspected to be the result of a neurological defect and though not sound disability. Dyslexia is diagnosed in people of all levels of intelligence. Various researchers and organizations found that dyslexia is not one thing but many. According to the strictness of the disorder and the age of the individual, symptoms can vary says Shaywitz (2005). For instance researchers found symptoms according to the age group of children. It is hard to gain a certain diagnosis before a child begins school. However many children have a history of difficulties that began well before nursery according to Marshall (2004). The children who show these symptoms have a higher risk than other children who diagnosed. Some of these symptoms are: delays in speech, learns new words slowly and has difficulty rhyming words such as nursery rhymes (Nicolson, & Fawcett, 2008). Early primary school-age children show such symptoms as: difficulty learning the alphabet in order, difficulty with associating sounds with the letters that represent them. (sound-symbol correspondence), difficulty identifying or generating rhyming words, or counting syllables in words (phonological awareness), difficulty of dividing words into individual sounds (phonemic awareness),difficulty with word retrieval or naming problems, difficulty learning to decode words and difficulty of mixing up sounds in multisyllable words (auditory discrimination) (Jeffries, & Everatt, 2004). Older primary school children show such symptoms as: slow or inaccurate reading / very poor spelling even though these children can read to an extent, difficulty of reading out loud / reads word in the wrong order/ skips words / sometimes speak a word similar to another word, difficulty associating individual words with their correct meanings, difficulty with organization skills, due to fear of speaking incorrectly some children became shy to talk and are being harassed. One major fallacy of dyslexia is writing words backwards / or letters move when reading. According to Stowe (2000) Teachers can identify dyslexic students when their writing. They do not seem to match their level of intelligence. The indiscriminate practice of putting dyslexic and non- dyslexic students together in a classroom makes a teachers task that much more challenging. There are so many theories on the subject of Developmental Dyslexia that have evolved ever since the disorder was first identified by Oswald Berkhan in 1881 (Csépe, 2003). The following are some of the commonly known theories that have attracted the attention of both professional psychologists and lay people in the recent past including Vygotsky theory, Cerebellar Theory, Visual Theory, Magnocellular Theory and Phonological Theory. The Vygostky theory has more merits than the other theories though no particular theory has more advantage over the rest. This constructivist theory is particularly beneficial for the teacher or the mentor to design and implement a program of active involvement in the dyslexic’s affairs. In other words this theory has a consociational paradigm. The theory has a degree of pluralism under especially definable circumstances where the dyslexic’s response to the external stimuli becomes normal. These are assumptions and not conclusions. Societal prejudices against dyslexia have a wider prevalence and therefore the individual teachers involvement is curtailed by the limited scope of action within the school setting (Karolyi, 2001). Vygotsky’s theory can be identified as one of the foundation for a social constructivism theory. In fact Vygotsky’s theory focused on the relationship between people and the socio cultural context in which they act and interact in shared experiences with each other. According to Vygotsky, people use tools that develop from a culture, such as speech and writing, to interact with their social environments. Especially children develop these tools, speech and writing to serve as social functions which fulfill communicate needs (Everatt, 1997). Vygotsky believed that the internalization of these tools directed to improve the thinking skills of a student. 3. Methodology 3.1. Primary Research This Chapter presents the research methodology utilised to analyse the research data and describes the various methods used in this study. This research paper basically consists of two data sets – primary and secondary. Primary data set would consist of a questionnaire administered to 10 teachers and 10 parents of dyslexic students in the school where the researcher is teaching. Responses to the questionnaire would be sifted and collated to identify significant trends and a regression of the dyslexic students’ learning patterns. Secondary data would be collected through an extensive research effort conducted both online and in libraries. The researcher would extensively use the books written on the topic and also study research journals, reports, graphs, articles, newspaper articles and so on. References would be taken from most of the research material available in the field. Secondary information sources such as libraries, commercial bibliographic databases for peer review, internet resources and e-journals would be used for the literature review. The proposed research study would be quantitative in nature but encompass elements of qualitative research also so that better and more accurate conclusions could be achieved. Since the research involves the study of the impact of dyslexia on students and special emphasis on how their learning abilities are hampered, a sample size comprising of college students would be taken (Murphy, 2003). The study would be taking into account the conceptual model as well as the theoretical model. The samples selected and the questionnaires would be prepared as per the theoretical model of survey and a wider conceptual model of the research would be used to analyze the data. The primary research aspect of this paper would consist of a questionnaire. i Questionnaire The questions in the questionnaire would be planned in advance. The questionnaire would be given to 20 respondents – 10 teachers and 10 parents of dyslexic students in the school where the researcher is teaching. The researcher would exercise some discretion as to how these questions might be explained but the aim is to standardize data as far as possible and to eliminate biases and prejudices due to different patterns in wording. The questions in the questionnaire may be phrased in such a manner that the respondent might exercise some discretion in answering or not. The possible answers are would be predefined so that the respondent’s freedom in responding to the question is limited to one of the pre-coded responses and thus data analysis is rendered easier. a Preparation of questionnaire This is the most significant aspect in the design and planning process of a primary research program because a haphazardly designed questionnaire might jeopardize an otherwise well carried out survey. During this phase it is often desirable to plan ahead for the different outcomes related to variables and tabulations for later analysis. It is much more desirable that a dummy tabulation technique ought to have been prepared in advance, if possible. This researcher would adopt such an approach. Such an approach would facilitate the inclusion of the right information. In preparing the questionnaire this researcher kept the following points in mind to avoid unwanted dilemmas. Only the most relevant questions would be included. Personal questions would be framed in such a manner in order to avoid inconvenience. Questions would be ordered in a logical sequence. Those supposedly awkward personal questions would be excluded. b Administration of Questionnaire Once the questionnaire is prepared it may be administered by three different methods. i Direct personal interviews. ii Email inquiry iii Telephonic conversation. In this research study the direct method would be used. This method is thought to be much more desirable because most of the respondents are educated and co-operative and they realise the significance and relevance of the questionnaire. In these instances there is an obvious problem associated with non-response due to negligence on the part of respondents. However in the current circumstances such negligence is assumed to be minimal. Measurement techniques would comprise of questionnaires and interview schedules. Primary data collection would be collected through detailed and qualitative and quantitative questionnaires prepared, keeping in mind the impact of dyslexia on students. Special interview schedules would also be used to gauge the responses of the parents and teachers towards dyslexia. Future research possibilities in the field are discussed in depth to show how theoretical underpinnings evolve with time and space with specific reference to current dyslexic students’ alternative ways to fulfill educational requirements (Morris, & Patricia, 2007). There is little or no substantive literature to underpin the methodology of metrically determining the feasibility, attraction and obstacles to creating a theoretical conceptual contingency model on the current dyslexic students’ behaviors (Fawcett, 2001). This predicament applies to school students, especially in the school where the researcher currently works and similar approaches adopted elsewhere at other schools in the UK. This particular handicap would affect this researcher to a greater extent. However the research methodology segment of this paper places emphasis on the qualitative aspect of it rather than the quantitative aspect. As such the available empirical evidence would be greatly utilized by the researcher to delineate the current line of arguments as expounded in the Literature Review of this paper. 3.2. Secondary Research Secondary data would be collected through an extensive research effort conducted both online and in libraries. The researcher would extensively use the books written on the topic and also study research journals, reports, graphs, articles, newspaper articles and so on. References would be taken from most of the research material available in the field. This study depends mainly on the secondary material, because theoretical analysis is much well facilitated by it than primary material which is basically limited to responses in the questionnaire. The available literature would be analyzed with specific focus on how dyslexia affects students. This researcher would try to show the most important aspectual overview of the research in the Literature Review (Gabrieli, 2009). Also there would be considerable reflection on the state and relevance of current research. There is little or no critical literature to support the methodology of metrically determining the feasibility, attraction and obstacles to creating a theoretical conceptual contingency model on dyslexic students. This particular handicap would affect the researcher to a greater extent. However the research methodology segment of this paper places emphasis on the qualitative aspect of it rather than the quantitative aspect. 3.3. Data Analysis Qualitative and quantitative data analysis would be undertaken in this study and all the answers to the іntervіew questions would be entered into a structured database (SPSS) upon receipt and would ultimately be examined by respondent category. Due to the subjective nature of сategorіzіng respondents’ questions and extracting themes from thе answers, іndіvіdual analyses of all questionnaires will be performed separately by different analysts. After іndіvіdual analysis, the different analysts would meet together and сompіle a list of all the іdentіfіed issues and themes. Overlapping issues and themes between analysts would be subsequently removed or renamed to produce a more сonсіse list for сodіng analysis. The сodіng scheme would generate in this first stage of analysis, the analysts іndіvіdually will scan the respondents’ texts and сategorіze all respondents’ answers. Respondents’ answers will be coded several times if they сontaіn more than one theme. Comprehensive sampling with wide ranging areas which are impacted due to dyslexia on the school children, would be introduced in the questionnaires and interview schedules so that the scope of study is large enough to ensure the success of the research’s aims and objectives. Another strong point of the study is the wide diversity in the sample selected which would ensure wide scope of children behavioral pattern (Goswami, 2002). The study would also ensure the adequate focus is maintained by the authorities, including the government, on the welfare schemes of the school going children when they are especially vulnerable due to dyslexia that are adversely affecting their studies. A number of minor and major limitations associated with this research project were encountered by this researcher in the process. In the first instance a substantial lack of existing literature on the subject has been a major handicap. Secondly the limited sample population for both the questionnaire and the survey didn’t permit the researcher to draw broader conclusions on the implications of the research program (Mortimore, & Crozier, 2006). For instance the impact on the potential school students’ less motivation on their studies has not been fully investigated because the time factor wasn’t taken into consideration in sifting the results of the questionnaire. 3.4. Ethical considerations The rapid globalisation has brought in an era of pluralistic society and large segment of student fraternity comprise of students from different race, color, culture and nationality. Therefore, one often comes across moral and ethical dilemma while dealing with people with cross cultural values. Efforts would be made to understand cross cultural values so as to maintain a conflict free atmosphere while interacting with people coming from different cultural background. 4. Recommendations The existing system of coordination between the teaching staff and parents must be streamlined to include such factors as parental feedback on their dyslexic children’s behavioral changes, the level of clinical intervention being undertaken by parents and elders as a measure of treatment and the dyslexic’s response to such intervention (Gray, 2008). Teachers themselves ought to monitor the progress of their wards’ behavioral changes as a measure of response to the school setting. 4. Conclusion Dyslexia is a neurological condition which influences person’s ability to read and spell written language. It is learned many people with dyslexia have auditory processing problems. Some children can affect auditory processing disorder as a result of experiencing otitis media with effusion. So far no cure found for dyslexia, but such individuals can learn to read and write with the help of appropriate educational support. For instance alphabet writing systems can use for childs responsiveness for corresponding between graphemes and phonemes. In using modern neuro-imaging techniques like functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) and Positron Emission Tomography (PET) can diagnose brain defects of dyslexia children. It is known that children with dyslexia have a deficit in parts of the left hemisphere of the brain which is involved in reading. Recent researches institute the visible differences in how the dyslexic brain functions when compared to the brain of typical reader. Using fMRI found during reading tasks good readers display strong activation in the back of the brain with less activation in the front of the brain. This normal pattern shows totally opposite in the dyslexic individuals. A study of University of Hong Kong argues that depending on the language children use to read dyslexia affects different structural parts of childrens brains. The study focused on children who read English and reading Chinese. Genetic tendency may be one of the causes of dyslexia since frequently members of the same family have dyslexia. Molecular studies found out certain genetic markers link with dyslexia. According to 2007 review report, there are no specific cognitive processes known to influence susceptibility genes. Many long long-term research programs pointed out heterogeneity in the genetic and brain basis and behavioral expression of dyslexia. Dyslexia has no link with IQ. Many smart people have it such as Winston Churchill and Albert Einstein. If dyslexia is untreated, children may lose their motivation in schoolwork due to the stress and struggle involved in effort to understand material. Dyslexia occurs among people of all ethnic groups and economic backgrounds. The well trained professionals can diagnose individuals who have dyslexia through a formal evaluate the reading and writing skills, along with their strengths and their weaknesses. It is also need to investigate the family history, educational background, social environment, and other factors. Diagnosing dyslexia at an early stage can prevent stress and frustration. Research shows individuals who have never been treated have learning disabilities and end up working in jobs below their intellectual ability. If early diagnosed person can seek extra help from teachers to achieve reading and writing success as what normal person do. References 1. Nicolson, R I & Fawcett, AJ 2008, ‘Dyslexia Learning and the Brain’, Journal of Medicine, vol.359, no.25, pp.283. 2. Alexander, A W & Slinger-Constant, A M 2004, ‘Current status of treatments for dyslexia: Critical review’, Journal of Child Neurology, vol.19, no. 10, pp.744-758. 3. 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