In this study, 122 second-grade Dutch children with dyslexia participated in a two-phase intervention focusing on declarative and procedural learning. The intervention was meticulously designed to address both reading and spelling challenges, and the results were promising. Here’s what you need to know:
Key Findings from the Research
- Improvement in Skills: Children with dyslexia showed significant improvements in reading accuracy, efficiency, and spelling skills over the two phases of the intervention.
- Role of Phonological Awareness: Phoneme deletion was a strong predictor of success in reading and spelling accuracy.
- Importance of Rapid Automatized Naming (RAN): RAN was a critical predictor of reading efficiency, highlighting the need to include tasks that improve naming speed in interventions.
- Initial Abilities Matter: Children's initial reading and spelling abilities significantly predicted their post-intervention outcomes, both directly and indirectly.
Practical Applications for Practitioners
Based on these findings, here are actionable steps you can take to enhance your intervention programs:
- Focus on Phonological Awareness: Incorporate activities that enhance phoneme deletion skills. This could involve tasks where children manipulate sounds within words, such as removing or substituting phonemes.
- Enhance Naming Speed: Integrate exercises that improve rapid automatized naming. This can include timed activities where children name sequences of digits, letters, or objects as quickly as possible.
- Tailor Interventions to Initial Abilities: Assess children's reading and spelling abilities at the start of the intervention. Use this data to tailor your approach, ensuring that activities are appropriately challenging and targeted.
- Sustained and Multi-Phase Approach: Implement a two-phase intervention strategy that begins with declarative learning (focusing on accuracy) and progresses to procedural learning (focusing on fluency).
Encouraging Further Research
While the study provides robust evidence for the effectiveness of a two-phase intervention, further research is essential to refine these strategies and explore their applicability across different languages and age groups. Practitioners are encouraged to contribute to this body of knowledge by conducting their own research and sharing findings with the community.
To read the original research paper, please follow this link: Predicting responsiveness to a sustained reading and spelling intervention in children with dyslexia.
