Admission and Follow-up Status of Reading Disabled Children Referred to a Medical Clinic

Abstract

Fifty-eight reading disabled children referred to a medical clinic for developmentally disabled children were examined on admission and after 3 to 5 years of special educational intervention. As a group, the children showed minimal gains in reading, remaining among the poorest readers for age. However, one-third of the children (mainly the older ones) made sufficient progress which, while slowly achieved, resulted in a minimal degree of functional reading. A high proportion of the children were diagnosed as having neurologic and/or psychiatric disorders which were unrelated to the level of reading failure found within the group. The findings suggested that such children are not representative of the general population of poor readers in the community and that throughout their schooling they require special educational methods, other than reading, for the acquisition of subject matter.

Long-Term Follow-up Studies of Learning-Disabled Persons

“…This issue has been discussed by other writers (e.g., Cone , 1971). Also, the greatest improvement, in terms of percentile ranks, was made by children with the highest initial scores while the least improvement was made by children with the lowest initial scores (Gottesman et al, 1975). Thus, these studies suggest that the children who initially were more severely disabled made less progress and scored lower at follow-up than children who were less severely disabled.…”

“…Koppitz (1976) has commented on this phenomenon in her followup study. Also, Gottesman et al (1975) noted that children who were youngest upon admission to their program generally showed the greatest losses over time while the older initial admissions generally stayed the same over time. However, Muehl and Forell (1973-74) reported a significant negative correlation between age of diagnosis and high school reading ability, indicating that early diagnosis was related to better outcome.…”

“…Initial Subject Selection Criteria. The Table 1 STUDY Gottesman, Belmont, &Kaminer(1975) importance of the initial subject selection criteria for the long-term outcome of learning disabilities is illustrated by Yule's (1973) study of the Isle of Wight children. In this study, two groups of problem learners were followed.…”

“…Of the ten studies which used middle-class children (Abbott & Frank, 1975;Ackerman et al, 1977b;Balow & Bloomquist, 1965;Edgington, 1975;Frauenheim, 1978;Hinton & Knights, 1971;Kline & Kline, 1975;Muehl & Forell, 1973;Rawson, 1968;Rourke & Orr, 1977), 50% reported a favorable outcome. Of the four studies which studied working class (and lower) socioeconomic class children (Balow, 1965;Gottesman et al, 1975;Koppitz, 1976;Werner & Smith, 1979), 100% had unfavorable outcomes. Thus, socioeconomic status appears to be related to long-term outcome of learning disabilities.…”

Fifteen-year stability of some neuropsychological tests in learning disabled subjects with and without neurological impairment

“…Follow-up studies of children with learning disabilities have been concerned with specific effects of treatment (Bradley, Battin, & Sutter, 1979;Gottesman, Belmont, & Kaminer, 1975;Hardy, 1968;Koppitz, 197 l), emotional and/or behavioral adjustment problems (Balow & Blomquist, 1965;Peter & Spreen, 1979), academic achievement (Howden, 1967;Preston & Yarington, 1967;Robinson & Smith, 1962), occupational outcome (Bruck, 1985;Hardy, 1968;Preston & Yanngton, 1967;Robinson & Smith, 1962), intelligence and socioeconomic status (Howden, 1967;Rawson, 1968;Robinson & Smith, 1962), specific deficits, improvements, as well as presence or absence of brain dysfuntioddamage (Kaste, 1971;Spreen, 1982). The purpose of most of these studies was to examine whether the children with learning disabilities "grow out of' associated symptomatology in adolescence and/or early adulthood.…”