Early Identification of Children At Risk for Reading Disabilities

Abstract

The present study examined the development of phonological and reading skills in 171 students (98 males, 73 females) from the beginning of first grade (Time 1) to the end of second grade (Time 4). Based on their reading and intelligence scores at the end of second grade, these students were placed into nondisabled (ND), reading disabled (RD), or garden-variety poor reading (GV) groups. Although each group made gains in phonological processing, large differences were found between the ND and RD/GV groups. The RD and GV groups performed similarly on many of the tasks. Consistent with the literature, it was found that intelligence does not differentiate between good and poor readers. The most important finding of the present study was that reader-group membership at Time 4 could be very accurately determined from students' Time 1 scores. All of the children in the RD and GV groups were correctly identified, and only 3 of the 148 ND children were misclassified, indicating that children at risk for reading difficulties can be very accurately identified very early in their academic experiences.

Subgrouping Poor Readers on the Basis of Individual Differences in Reading-Related Abilities

“…This cutoff level is similar to that used by other researchers in the field of reading disabilities (e.g., Hurford, Schauf, Bunce, Blaich, & Moore, 1994;Meyer, Wood, Hart, & Felton, 1998). It also represents a compromise criterion level when compared to that found in more liberal definitions (25th percentile; Fletcher et al, 1994;Stanovich & Siegel, 1994) or in more conservative definitions of reading disabilities (1.5 SD; Badian, McAnulty, Duffy, & Als, 1990).…”

Examination of Three Techniques for Identifying First-Grade Children at Risk for Difficulty in Word Identification With an Emphasis on Reducing the False Negative Error Rate

“…Overall accuracy of reader group placement at the end of first grade was 99% with 0% and 1.0% false negative and false positive rates, respectively. Hurford, Schauf et al (1994) followed these students until the end of second grade with similar results (98% accuracy with 0% and 1.8% false negative and false positives rates, respectively). As the children to be assessed become older and the temporal distance between assessment and reader group placement shortens, accuracy increases (see Scarborough, 1998 for a review of prediction research).…”

Kindergarten cognitive intervention for reading difficulties: The PREP remediation in Greek

“…Children at risk for reading failure and those identified with dyslexia from early on often perform poorly on measures referring to phonological awareness (Blachman, 1994;Byrne & Fielding-Barnsley, 1993;Elbro, Borström, & Petersen, 1998;Felton & Brown, 1990;Hurford, Schauf, Bunce, Blaich, & Moore, 1994;Schneider, Ennemoser, Roth, & Küspert, 1999), and the retaining of phonological information in working memory or successive processing (Papadopoulos, 2002;Porpodas, 1999;Schneider, Roth, & Ennemoser, 2000). Phonological awareness refers to the ability to explicitly reflect on the sound structure of spoken language by isolating and manipulating the constituent sounds of spoken words, whereas the retaining of phonological information in working memory or successive processing refers mostly on the ability to recall sequence of sounds and/or words or even sentences (Porpodas, 1999).…”