Advances in Reading Intervention

Carol McDonald Connor, Peggy McCardle

• Publisher: Brookes Publishing
• Year: 2015
• ISBN:
  9781681250427
• Topic: Didattica
• Subtopic: Difficoltà di apprendimento

Effective early reading intervention depends on research and practice that leads to positive changes in classroom practice and better student reading outcomes. This important volume promotes the valuable "research to practice to research" loop, bringing top experts and practitioners together to examine what we know—and what we need to know—about effective reading and writing intervention. The newest addition to the respected Extraordinary Brain series, this book compiles and expands on critical findings presented at The Dyslexia Foundation's biannual symposium. More than 35 researchers and practitioners explore the latest on topics relevant to effective reading and writing education, from neurobiology and genetics to specific strategies for translating research into intervention—and learning from the results of these interventions to inform new research. The concluding chapters map out key priorities for future research and innovation. An essential text for teachers, reading specialists, reading researchers, administrators, and students in graduate courses, this volume marks a significant step toward resolving the literacy challenges of young learners. It will also help move the field toward a firmly established "research to practice to research" collaboration among researchers and practitioners. KEY TOPICS COVERED:

• neurobiological bases of word recognition and comprehension
• how behavioral genetics can inform education
• translating and applying research to the classroom
• designing and interpreting the results of randomized controlled trials (RCTs)
• the correlation between rapid automatized naming (RAN) speed and reading development
• the impact of eye movement research on our understanding of skilled reading
• reading development and difficulties among English Language Learners
• dialect variation in African American children
• the writing challenges of children with dyslexia and Language Learning Difficulty (LLD)
• developing research ideas from classroom and school experiences
• specific considerations for the field as it progresses and develops
• and more

I

Introduction

1

Research to Practice to Research

The Importance of Reciprocity to Building Better Interventions

Carol McDonald Connor and Peggy McCardle

Reading is essential to life success, including further education, overall health and well-being, and employability (Reynolds, Temple, Robertson, & Mann, 2002). It is key to gaining knowledge and information through the educational system and in society more generally through traditional media, such as books and newspapers; through information given by medical care and other service providers; or through more modern technologies, such as computers and smartphones. Even television viewing involves a certain amount of reading. All types of employment require some reading. Yet according to the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP, 2013), at least one third of U.S. children in Grades 4, 8, and 12 do not read well enough to function in society. Research is ongoing about how individuals learn to read and write, how the brain processes written information, and the role genetics plays in reading and reading difficulties. Much less is known, however, about how to bring this information to the classroom, optimal ways to teach children to read considering all their individual differences, and how best to identify those who cannot read or who struggle with learning to read early enough to prevent the more serious sequelae of dyslexia.

Rigorously tested interventions exist for struggling readers (e.g., Al Otaiba et al., 2014; Foorman, Francis, Fletcher, Schatschneider, & Mehta, 1998; Mathes et al., 2005; Vaughn, Denton, & Fletcher, 2010) and more are coming to market regularly. Yet for many existing and new interventions, there is little evidence showing whether or not they actually work and if they work, which children might benefit from them. Accumulating evidence shows that not every solution works equally well for each individual child (Connor et al., 2013). Furthermore, it is important to know how and why some interventions work for some children and not for others. It appears to be more difficult to intervene successfully with older students—those in middle school and beyond—and for them, the intervention process seems to take longer (Hill, Bloome, Black, & Lipsey, 2008; Vaughn et al., 2012). Preschool and early elementary school–age children generally appear to respond more quickly to interventions (Hill et al., 2008), yet insufficient data exist on early identification and how best to target interventions for those with the most severe impairments or those with linguistic differences that may make the process more challenging, such as speaking a dialect or home language that is not the dialect or language of instruction in the school.

Although more research is needed, additional challenges exist: how best to get effective interventions into the hands of practitioners who can implement them in schools, how to move research into practice, and how to learn from practice. How do we find ways to improve existing interventions and innovatively design new ones to meet the changing demands of today’s educational settings?

This volume is based on the 14th Extraordinary Brain Symposium, convened in June 2014 by The Dyslexia Foundation with the goal of mapping a realistic, actionable 5-year plan for reading intervention research. Intervening with children who struggle with reading is a topic that has been researched for several decades, more intensively in some periods than in others, but it has always included the challenges of forging strong links between research and practice. One key goal of this meeting was to forge a research agenda that could move the field forward innovatively in terms of how researchers can design and test interventions that are informed by input from the practice community regarding its needs and how best to move research into practice so that it can have a direct effect on the lives of struggling readers and their families. We see this as a reciprocal process whereby the research that leads to changes in or enhancements of practice will be further informed by what is learned as evidence-based practices are implemented in schools and classrooms and as further challenges are experienced—hence the title of this book, Advances in Reading Intervention: Research to Practice to Research.

The symposium began with presentations from teachers and educational leaders from independent schools that focus on serving children with learning differences and from individuals representing intervention programs or approaches. They presented their most pressing questions to the convened researchers, who, in their own presentations, addressed the implications of their research or future possibilities for research to affect practice—and the contributors have done so in this volume as well. The chapters are based on the presentations given at the symposium but are also informed by the rich discussion that took place there, including interactions with practitioners not only in the initial and final sessions but throughout the entire week. This process enriched the meeting, so all contributors were committed to have that same richness infuse this volume.

Section I, “Introduction,” includes an overview of reading intervention research by Lovett (Chapter 2) and is followed by three sections: basic science considerations, intervention, and a finale that offers a look ahead. In Section II, “Basic Considerations for Reading Intervention: Behavior, Neurobiology, and Genetics,” seven chapters address these key areas of science. Morrison (Chapter 3) addresses the issue of self-regulation, an aspect of executive function whose role in learning and education is drawing increasing attention and whose role should certainly be considered in reading intervention. Bartlett, Yates, Flax, and Brzustowicz (Chapter 4) offer an innovative, nonlinear model of reading comprehension that can increase the power of statistical inferences. Sideridis, Georgiou, Simos, Mouzaki, and Stamovlasis (Chapter 5) present information on why rapid automatized naming predicts reading performance with a new hypothesis (generic shutdown) that uses a new analytic approach; the authors provide an innovative view of reading performance as dynamic and determined by the complex interplay between cognitive abilities and affective/motivational states. Miller (Chapter 6) shares information about past and recent work on eye movement and looks toward its potential usefulness in studying reading intervention. Cutting, Bailey, Barquero, and Aboud (Chapter 7) and Del Tufo and Pugh (Chapter 8) discuss the underlying neurobiology of reading at various levels. Hart (Chapter 9) presents information on how behavioral genetics might be used to improve the education process in the classroom. Gaab then integrates thoughts about these six chapters as an ensemble.

Section III, “Reading and Writing Interventions: Research to Inform Practice,” comprises nine chapters on intervention. This section is introduced by Mele-McCarthy (Chapter 10), who was one of the practice representatives at the symposium; she summarizes the key practice questions and issues that were raised by this group and discussed throughout the week. Connor (Chapter 11) offers a discussion on literacy intervention in the early grades. Three chapters address language issues that can affect reading development and intervention: Patton Terry (Chapter 12) discusses the issue of nonmainstream dialect, its potential impact on reading, and possibilities for instruction and intervention, and Lesaux (Chapter 13) and Walker, Capin, and Vaughn (Chapter 14) deal with English-learning students who struggle with English reading. Jiménez (Chapter 15) discusses teacher continuing education and Connelly and Dockrell (Chapter 16) and Alves and Limpo (Chapter 17) offer chapters on writing important aspects of literacy that have been neglected until recently. Finally, Coyne (Chapter 18) challenges us to consider how intervention effectiveness is approached. Washington provides an integrative summary of Chapters 10–18 with thoughts about future research.

In the last section, “Finale: Looking to the Future” (Chapter 19), Jodoin discusses innovation and technology from an outsider’s perspective as one who is neither an interventionist nor a basic science researcher but whose thoughts on how researchers and practitioners all might think more innovatively and use technology more creatively should help us move forward. Compton and Steacy’s perspectives chapter (Chapter 20) reflects on what we have learned and what we can learn from the various chapters in this volume. And we as coeditors (Chapter 21) offer thoughts on the next 5 years, summarizing future research directions in which the field might break important new ground not only in literacy intervention research but also in how best to build and maintain the reciprocal link that has become commonly discussed but too infrequently realized: research informing practice informing research.

REFERENCES

Al Otaiba, S., Connor, C.M., Folsom, J.S., Greulich, L., Wanzek, J., Schatschneider, C., & Wagner, R.K. (2014). To wait in Tier 1 or intervene immediately: A randomized experiment examining first grade response to intervention (RTI) in reading. Exceptional Children, 81(1), 11–27. doi: 10.1177/0014402914532234

Connor, C.M., Morrison, F.J., Fishman, B., Crowe, E.C., Al Otaiba, S., & Schatschneider, C. (2013). A longitudinal cluster-randomized controlled study on the accumulating effects of individualized literacy instruction on students’ reading from first through third grade. Psychological Science, 24(8), 1408–1419. doi:10.1177/0956797612472204

Foorman, B.R., Francis, D.J., Fletcher, J.M., Schatschneider, C., & Mehta, P. (1998). The role of instruction in learning to read: Preventing reading failure in at risk children. Journal of Educational Psychology, 90, 37–55.

Hill, C., Bloome, H., Black, A.R., & Lipsey, M.W. (2008). Empirical benchmarks for interpreting effect sizes in research. Child Development Perspectives, 2(3), 172–177.

Mathes, P.G., Denton, C.A., Fletcher, J.M., Anthony, J.L., Francis, D.J., & Schatschneider, C. (2005). The effects of theoretically different instruction and student characteristics on the skills of struggling readers. Reading Research Quarterly, 40(2), 148–182.

National Assessment of Educational Progress. (2013). The nation’s report card. Retrieved from http://nces.ed.gov/nationsreportcard

Reynolds, A.J., Temple, J.A., Robertson, D.L., & Mann, E.A. (2002). Age 21 cost-benefit analysis of the Title I Chicago child-parent centers. Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis, 24(4), 267–303.

Vaughn, S., Denton, C.A., & Fletcher, J.M. (2010). Why intensive interventions are necessary for students with severe reading difficulties. Psychology in the Schools, 47(5), 432–444.

Vaughn, S., Wexler, J., Leroux, A., Roberts, G., Denton, C., Barth, A., & Fletcher, J. (2012). Effects of intensive reading intervention for eighth-grade students with persistently inadequate response to intervention. Journal of Learning Disabilities, 45(6), 515–525.

2

An Overview of Reading Intervention Research

Perspectives on Past Findings, Present Questions, and Future Needs

Maureen W. Lovett

Three decades of work in the relatively young science of reading intervention research have been productive, revealing many positive findings about how to intervene with children and adolescents who struggle to learn to read because of dyslexia, reading disabilities, or other causes. There appears to be compelling evidence that effective intervention for readers struggling with acquiring basic reading skills should include 1) explicit, systematic, phonologically based instruction with ample opportunities for practice and cumulative review; 2) systematic instruction on all levels of written language structure, from subsyllabic and sublexical dimensions to different text and discourse structures; 3) instruction and scaffolded practice to promote the application and transfer of newly acquired skills to new materials; 4) modeling, teaching, and mentoring of specific reading, self-regulation, and self-monitoring strategies; 5) an integration of decoding and spelling to stress the reciprocity of these activities; and 6) daily attention to vocabulary growth and comprehension development using a variety of appealing and complex texts. The amount of empirical evidence for these recommended ingredients of effective reading intervention decreases with list placement, although all can be considered to have good supporting evidence.

There are also data to suggest that improvement in reading skills may continue, with long-term investments in instruction and effort, into adulthood but that the “gap” between struggling and typical readers is rarely if ever completely closed for more severe cases of dyslexia. Some residual symptoms of reading disability (RD) tend to persist into adulthood, even with strong literacy and educational outcomes (Bruck, 1992; Shaywitz et al., 1999). We also know that early intervention for children at risk of reading-acquisition failure appears to be an excellent investment of time and resources, as it generally yields very positive outcomes (Denton, Fletcher, Taylor, Barth, & Vaughn, 2014; Foorman, Francis, Fletcher, Mehta, & Schnatschneider, 1998; Wanzek & Vaughn, 2007, 2008). Early intervention, with adequate infrastructure within the school and the availability of later “booster” interventions when needed, has been shown to be effective (Al Otaiba et al., 2014). Adolescents and adults with limited reading skills, in contrast, are far more difficult to remediate (Vaughn & Fletcher, 2010; Vaughn et al., 2012) and require a far greater investment of resources over time. It is important to recognize, however, that it is not too late for the remediation of older readers if effective intervention is available, along with group support and the reader’s motivation to improve reading skills (Lovett, Lacerenza, De Palma, & Frijters, 2012).

Despite substantial advances, many aspects of effective treatment for dyslexia and other reading problems remain to be identified. There exists fairly strong evidence on how to teach decoding and word identification skills, but the field has not made sufficient progress in how to accelerate the growth of word-reading efficiency and text reading fluency. Research has revealed some general parameters of what constitutes effective comprehension instruction, but we still lack a comprehensive blueprint of how to help a struggling reader with poor oral language skills or a struggling English learner (EL) become a good comprehender and how to measure that end goal. There are gaps in which our understanding about RD and effective intervention falls short, gaps made more salient by new developments in related areas of cognitive, learning, and education sciences that could but have not influenced thinking and practices. Some areas of concern in interventi...