Marbles+-+COLLINS+and+MATTHEY

“…theories abound as to the probable causes of such reading difficulties. They include sensory-motor difficulties, language related problems, neuropsychological impairments, and socio-emotional deficits, to name but a few (cf. Ceci, 1986). There are consequently a host of different treatments for reading difficulties, with a total of 51 methods listed in one reference manual alone (Weller and Buchanan, 1988). These range from social skills training, to neurological impress methods and multi-sensory integration approaches, to psycho-educational and learning-theory based approaches (cf. Weller and Buchanan, 1988).” (p. 66)

“Most recently Lammin-maki, Ahonen, de Barra, Tolvanen, Michelsson and Lyttinen (1997) compared a neurocognitive treatment with a homework assistance programme. The former consisted of specialist input on perceptual, numerical and expressive language skills, provided by psychologists, speech therapists, physiotherapists and special education teachers. The latter consisted of an enriched home programme for better reading, with time set aside for a specialist teacher to work with the child and improve phonics and sound blending. Both programmes lasted for 9.5 months (a total of 76 hours <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; text-align: justify;">intervention), and both were successful in improving performance on a variety of <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; text-align: justify;">tests, although the authors noted a greater improvement on actual reading tests for <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; text-align: justify;">the enriched home programme. **This highlights the importance of providing assist-** <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">** ance to children within their home environment.” ** (p. 66)

<span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; text-align: justify;">“Staats (1996) argues that reading skills are comprised of a number of basic behavioural <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; text-align: justify;">repertoires. These include language-cognitive repertoires as well as sensory-motor and emotional- <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; text-align: justify;">motivational basic behavioural repertoires. Reading instruction needs to cater for all <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; text-align: justify;">of these repertoires in order to be successful (Staats, 1996).” (p. 66)

<span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; text-align: justify;">“Other principles of psycho-educational approaches are supportive, positive learning environments <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; text-align: justify;">and structured, achievable goals.” (p. 66)

<span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; text-align: justify;">“In considering behavioural methods for improving children's reading, the issue of <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; text-align: justify;">suitability of reward systems must be addressed. In a recent meta-analysis, Cameron <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; text-align: justify;">and Pierce (1994) discussed the evidence of the effect on a child's intrinsic motivation <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; text-align: justify;">to undertake a task and the use of verbal and tangible reinforcers. Much of the <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; text-align: justify;">research reviewed focused on tasks that the child already enjoys, and the authors <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; text-align: justify;">found that both verbal reinforcement (e.g. praise) and tangible reinforcement (e.g. <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; text-align: justify;">tokens), if given contingent upon performance level, did not harm an individual's <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; text-align: justify;">intrinsic motivation, even after such reinforcement was removed. Whether the same <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; text-align: justify;">finding applies to tasks an underachieving child does not find enjoyable ± such as <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; text-align: justify;">reading ± is uncertain, but the evidence would support the use of both types of <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; text-align: justify;">reinforcers in helping children change their behaviour. If change, or in particular <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; text-align: justify;">maintenance of change, does not occur, the efficacy of the two types of reinforcers <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; text-align: justify;">may be a factor that needs exploring.” (p. 67)

<span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">"They aimed to ensure that reading time was fun and that the parents provide positive <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">feedback to the child. A colour-coded token reinforcement system was used and these <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">were traded for a secondary reinforcer of money, which was gradually reduced as the children' s <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">motivation increased." (p. 67)

<span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">"These consisted of the following steps. <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">i) The parent identified words that the child would find difficult in their chosen <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">book, and wrote these words on index cards (one to a card) prior to reading <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">time. <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">ii) The child then attempted to read the words from the index cards. Successful <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">reading, or attempts, were rewarded with a paper clip. Prior to the child opening <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">the book all words would have been successfully read from the index cards. <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">iii) The child then read from the book. Paper clips were liberally given for successful <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">reading. <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">iv) After successful reading of the predetermined passage, comprehension questions <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">were given; first by the parent to the child (again, paper clips were given for <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">correct answers), and then by the child to the parent (and if the parent `slipped- <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">up' and got the answer wrong, the child got another paper clip). This process <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">aids `meaning-making,' which is vital to reading development so that the child <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">may begin to view reading as a fluid and communicative process (Hinchman and <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">Michel, 1999). <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">v) Trading-in the paper-clips for a secondary reinforcer. Two such reinforcers had <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">been discussed prior to commencing the reading practice. These were of the <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">nature of parent-child activities, such as a game of cards, playing soccer or <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">choosing the mealtime dessert. Where the identified child had siblings, the <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">secondary reinforcers were designed to be enjoyable for them too. A record <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">chart was drawn up by the child, and displayed in the house (e.g. on the fridge) <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">to monitor the child's progress and enable the other parent and visitors to praise <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">the child's progress.Parents were also taught how to assist with decoding (e.g. first sound; blending <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">two sounds together; covering-up the last part of a word until the child had decoded <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">the first part); the use of praise during reading practice; talking about the pictures;

<span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">and ignoring minor errors (such as `this' for `the'). This was carried out by the <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">therapist using the principles of modelling, feedback and reinforcement." (p. 70)

<span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">"Thus the session was based around making reading time fun and achievable, as <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">this has been demonstrated to promote success in children (Francis, 1997). The <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">therapist ensured that the child could read all the word cards, and thus when the <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">child looked at the book he immediately saw words that he could read, thus reducing <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">the anticipatory and performance anxiety. The parent, by giving paper-clips, could <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">see the progress being made by the child and the child's increased motivation, and <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">thus the parent experienced less stress." (p. 71)

<span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">"The successes reported by Ryback and Staats (1970) and Burns and Kondrick <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">(1998) have therefore been replicated in this study. Compared to the latter study, we <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">found that in the individual condition a much shorter period of instruction brought <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">about significant improvement in the children. Also, the simpler token reinforcement <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">system and non-monetary rewards are likely to be more appealing to parents. While <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">more personnel intensive studies such as the neurocognitive programme conducted <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">by Lamminmaki et al (1997) may benefit some children, their work shows that <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">for some, home-based instruction may bring about just as much change. We would <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">argue, however, that unless the parents are shown how to do this, then any change <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">brought about by specialist work in the classroom or home will not be as great as <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">might be achieved when motivated parents provide appropriate reading strategies for <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: justify;">their children." (p. 79)