Transcription
Hello everyone and welcome to the California Department of Education's Literacy Knowledge Building Video Series. In this video, Richard Gifford from the California Department of Education will give us an overview of the dyslexia guidelines.
Before we begin, let's go over a brief bit of background on a Literacy Knowledge Video Series. This is a series of videos on critical topics in literacy, birth through grade twelve. It was developed by the California Department of Education and literacy experts on the State Literacy Team, and it is complementary to the work of the federal Comprehensive Literacy State Development grants. You can learn more about the CLSD grant by going to the California Department of Education's website and searching for CLSD.
The purpose of this video series is to provide guidance and resources on critical topics and literacy to support the work of the CLSD grants and to build coherence between California's literacy guidance documents, standards, and frameworks and how they all support literacy. A major objective as a CLSD grant is to bring coherence between California's guidance documents, some of which you see here like the Preschool Learning Foundations, the Infant/Toddler Learning and Development Foundations, the Practitioners' Guide for Educating English Learners with Disabilities, the Dyslexia Guidelines, and the California English Learner Roadmap. Other content area standards and frameworks support literacy as well.
The videos produced in this series will illustrate the connections between all of these documents and also explain how the documents themselves support literacy development for our students. Videos will be produced over the course of the CLSD grant period. To be informed when new videos are posted, join the CLSD listserv by sending a blank email to join-California-literacy-state-development-program@mlist.cde.ca.gov.
And now I will turn it over to Richard.
[Richard] Thanks Jennifer. In this webinar, we're going to provide a broad overview of the California Dyslexia Guidelines and the information they provide to support students with dyslexia and other struggling readers.
In 2015, the California legislature passed Assembly Bill 1369 which directed the California Department of Education to develop guidelines to provide educational services and support for students with dyslexia. A work group was put together to assist CDE with this project. This work group consisted of reading researchers, parents, teachers, school administrators, medical professionals, and other stakeholders involved in the identification and education of students with dyslexia. You can find the Dyslexia Guidelines Work Group page by searching for Dyslexia Guidelines Work Group on the CDE website.
It's important to note that the dyslexia guidelines are not law. They aren't binding on districts or other entities, except for the statutes, regulations, and court decisions referenced in the guidelines. They're exemplary and compliance is not mandatory. However, they are a valuable source of information on dyslexia best practices that are aligned with a rigorous scientific research base.
Here you can see the table of contents for the dyslexia guidelines. Some of the topics covered by the guidelines include the definition of dyslexia and how it is addressed in the education code. What scientific research has revealed about the neurobiology of people with dyslexia. The characteristics of students with dyslexia and effective instructional approaches for students with dyslexia.
The image on the slide shows the following:
Chapter 1: A 21st Century Definition of Dyslexia on page 3.
Chapter 2: The Neuroscience of Dyslexia on page 6.
Chapter 3: Dyslexia as a Language-Learning Disability on page 9.
Chapter 4: Characteristics of Dyslexia by Age Group -- Strengths and Weaknesses on page 14.
Chapter 5: Socioemotional Factors of Dyslexia on page 24.
Chapter 6: When the Concern May Not Be Dyslexia on page 26.
Chapter 7: Dyslexia in English Learners on page 33.
Chapter 8: Pre-Service and In-Service Preparation for Educators on page 38.
Chapter 9: Screening and Assessment for Dyslexia on page 42.
Chapter 10: Special Education and 504 Plans on page 59.
Chapter 11: Effective Approaches for Teaching Students with Dyslexia on page 63.
Chapter 12: Assistive Technology on page 75.
Chapter 13: Information for Parents and Guardians on page 81.
Chapter 14: Frequently Asked Questions on page 95.
The guidelines include the International Dyslexia Association's definition of dyslexia. This definition has been widely adopted including by the National Institutes of Child Health and Human Development. It highlights that dyslexia is a learning disability, that it is neurobiological, it involves difficulties with accurate and fluent word recognition and spelling, and that these problems usually stem from a deficit in the phonological component of language. This language helps clarify that dyslexia is not due to visual problems as was once commonly believed.
The IDEA's definition goes on to point out that decoding issues experienced by students with dyslexia have secondary consequences that can include problems with reading comprehension and an overall reduction in the amount of reading, which has a negative impact on the development of vocabulary and background knowledge. So, the impact of dyslexia on comprehension is caused by multiple compounding factors. First, if students are struggling just to decode the words on the page, even if they can do this accurately, they don't have the cognitive resources to devote to comprehension. Also, because reading is so hard for them, these students do less of it. So they acquire less vocabulary and background knowledge, which a wealth of research tells us also has a significant impact on reading comprehension.
Dyslexia is also addressed in federal and state Education Code. It falls under the category of Specific Learning Disability, as you can see in this definition from the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. The eligibility category for special education services is Specific Learning Disability. This is what you typically see on special education paperwork. IDEA cites dyslexia as one type of specific learning disability. We also know that students with reading difficulties make up a significant percentage of our special education population. In California, this equates to roughly 50 percent of the students who have an individualized education program or IEP.
In addition to directing CDE to develop the dyslexia guidelines, AB 1369 changed Title 5 California Code of Regulations to require phonological processing be included in the basic psychological processes that can be evaluated when determining if an individual has a specific learning disability such as dyslexia. This served to highlight the important role evaluation of phonological processing plays in identifying students with dyslexia.
The Dyslexia Guidelines explain that phonological processing involves the interrelationship of phonological awareness, phonological memory, and rapid naming. Phonological awareness is the understanding that spoken language can be divided into smaller units like words, syllables, and phonemes. For example, the understanding that sentences are made up of individual words or that syllables can be combined to create words are expressions of phonological awareness. Phonemic awareness is a subset of phonological awareness. It is the ability to identify and manipulate the individual sounds of language. These individual sounds are called phonemes.
Examples of phonemic awareness include hearing the sounds /gu/, /oh/, /t/ and being able to recognize they make up the word "goat." Or identifying the individual sounds in the word bat, /b/, /a/ /t/, or identifying the word if you changed the /ch/ sound in "charm" to /f/. If you are able to produce the new word "farm", you've demonstrated phonemic awareness.
Phonological processing also involves phonological memory, which is the coding of phonological information in working or short-term memory. For example, if someone told me the code to a copier when I was at my desk, and then I walked over to the copier and was able to remember the code, that is phonological memory. Rapid naming or the efficient retrieval of phonological information from long term memory is another component of phonological processing. Examples of rapid naming include the ability to quickly name digits or letters or colors when you see them.
This graphic helps demonstrate the phonological processing hierarchy, just described. Phonological processing includes phonological memory, phonological awareness, and rapid naming. Phonemic awareness is a key subcomponent of phonological awareness, and it is comprised of phoneme blending, phoneme segmentation, and phoneme manipulation.
The guidelines include detailed information about the characteristics of dyslexia from preschool through college. Among these characteristics are the inability to sound out new words and a limited sight word vocabulary. In this context, sight words means words that can be immediately read when seen in print. The guidelines are not strictly referring to phonetically irregular words or high frequency words, which is the way the term sight words is often used in the classroom. Other common characteristics of dyslexia are a listening comprehension that exceeds reading comprehension, and an inadequate response to effective instruction and intervention.
We should discuss this last characteristic a little further. If 85 percent or more of students in a class are reading at grade level, then the lack of reading proficiency of the other students could be an indicator of dyslexia. However, in a class where only 60 percent of students are reading at grade level, this is no longer a reliable dyslexia indicator. This student performance profile indicates ineffective core reading instruction, which is negatively impacting students with and without dyslexia. This is one reason why it's so important to provide Tier One Literacy Instruction that is aligned with research. Large percentages of students not reaching reading benchmarks makes it difficult to identify students who are only going to make progress with intensive intervention and it overwhelms the school district's capacity to provide that intervention.
Research consistently demonstrates that science-based early literacy instruction and intervention is a powerful lever for addressing the needs of students with dyslexia and other struggling readers. The California Dyslexia Guidelines makes this point to highlight the importance of dyslexia screening and assessment.
These are some key definitions in the Screening And Assessing For Dyslexia chapter of the guidelines. Screening refers to evaluations conducted with all students in a grade level or school to help determine which students may need additional support. Assessment refers to a testing process conducted with individual students to determine the need for special education, and progress monitoring is used to inform instruction and to determine its effectiveness. The guidelines recommend that dyslexia screening and assessment focus on areas such as problems with word recognition, decoding and spelling, phonological processing deficits, reading issues that are unexpected in relationship to cognitive abilities, and effective instruction, and a family history of dyslexia should also be taken into account.
Identifying dyslexia in English learners can be a particular challenge. Some important information and recommendations from the Dyslexic Guidelines are highlighted here. It can be hard to distinguish between poor English reading skills that are due to dyslexia and reading deficits that are a result of limited exposure to English. One consequence of this, is that English learners are often identified with dyslexia much later than peers.
There are some skills such as phonological awareness and rapid naming that are particularly important to assess in the student's native language and English because they are major predictors of early reading ability and dyslexia, and they're strong indicators of later literacy outcomes which transfer across languages. To support student comprehension, someone who is competent in the student's native language should administer the evaluations. Also, whenever possible, the language or writing system to be evaluated should be English, as well as, the student's native language, especially if the native language is Spanish because there are many normed reference tests in Spanish.
English learners should receive instruction in intervention that aligns with the Guideline's recommendations on effective approaches for teaching students with dyslexia, that we will cover a little later in this webinar. However, there are some elements of instruction that need particular emphasis for English learners. These include: increased support for oral language development and an emphasis on building vocabulary; establishing predictable structure and routines to make it easier for students without an in-depth knowledge of English to understand expectations; modifying rate and complexity of language and providing language support as needed; and providing extra time to process language and respond, which is also a key accommodation for students with dyslexia.
The Guidelines recommend that schools and districts conduct dyslexia screening and assessment within a structured multi-tiered system of support. This MTSS should include Tier One for literacy instruction that is aligned to scientific research and that enables at least 80 percent or more of students to reach English language arts benchmarks. Tier Two should provide additional support to roughly 15 percent of students who are still struggling to master grade level literacy skills. And Tier Three, intensive intervention should be available for the students with the greatest needs.
Early intervention or additional direct instruction for struggling readers, should begin as early as kindergarten or first grade when the gap is small and students benefit from brain plasticity advantages for learning language based information. Research shows early intervention that takes advantage of young students brain plasticity is dramatically more effective than later remediation. For example, longitudinal studies show that 74 percent of children who are poor readers in the third grade remain poor readers in the ninth grade. And students who are not reading on grade level by the end of third grade are four times more likely to drop out of school before earning a high-school diploma. It is also critical to implement cohesive interventions that meet the criteria for effective instruction that we will discuss next. A piecemeal approach will not be effective for students with dyslexia.
As we mentioned earlier in the webinar, the Dyslexia Guidelines provide detailed information on effective instruction for students with dyslexia. This instruction should be evidence-based which means that approach has demonstrated evidence of effectiveness from well designed experimental studies or demonstrates a rationale based on high-quality research findings. It should be multisensory. Multisensory approaches incorporate two or more modalities simultaneously. Instruction should be direct and explicit. All concepts are directly and explicitly taught to students with continuous student/teacher interaction. Learning is never assumed. Instruction should be structured. This means that instruction follows step-by-step procedures for introducing, reviewing, and practicing concepts and instruction should be sequential, meaning that the organization of materials follows the logical order of language. The sequence begins with the easiest and most basic concepts and elements, and progresses systematically to the more difficult.
The previous slide addressed how to teach students with dyslexia. This is what you should teach. Instructions should include the teaching of phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension. These five pillars of reading instruction have been validated by decades of scientific research which has documented the effectiveness of this method of instruction for students with and without dyslexia. This instructional approach is also called Structured Literacy. The components of Structured Literacy are phonology, sound-symbol association, syllables, morphology, syntax, and semantics.
The CDE published the English Language Arts/ English Development Framework in 2014. It is a key guiding document for the delivery of literacy instruction in California public schools. You can see here, how the elements of effective instruction for students with dyslexia fall within the framework's key themes. Both documents emphasize the importance of developing foundational skills, vocabulary, and comprehension. These are essential components of delivering evidence-based core reading instruction and of implementing effective reading interventions.
In a later webinar, Dr. Maryanne Wolf will explore further the scientific research into dyslexia that informs how we support these students across age and grade levels. Thanks so much for joining us on this overview of the California Dyslexia Guidelines. And now I'll turn it back over to Jennifer.
[Jennifer] Thank you very much for viewing Dyslexia Guidelines overview. Access the discussion questions to deepen your learning with your colleagues and make sure to watch the next video in the series, The Science Behind Reading and Dyslexia.