On Dyslexia
On Dyslexia
On Dyslexia
A psychology case study is a thorough study of a single person, community or event that relies on
observations, facts and experiments to gather information. Psychologists collect information for a
case study through psychometric testing, observation, interviews, experiments and case study
archives.
What is a case profile?
It is a learning difficulty that primarily affects the skills involved in accurate and fluent word reading
and spelling.
i. Phenomenological Dyslexia
❏ Late talking
❏ Learning new words slowly
❏ Problems forming words correctly
❏ Problems remembering or naming letters,numbers, and colors.
❏ Difficulty learning nursery rhymes
❏ Playing rhyming games
Causes
Genetics. Dyslexia is highly genetic and runs in families. A child with one parent with dyslexia has a
30% to 50% chance of inheriting it. Genetic conditions like Down syndrome can also make dyslexia
more likely to happen.
Treatment
I. Educational therapies
The subject, JJ, was a 26 year old optometry student. While in the second grade, he was tested by a
school psychologist for dyslexia and other learning disabilities . An early diagnosis of dyslexia was
made following this battery of testing. Workbooks called "The Developmental Program in Visual
Perception : Pictures and Patterns" by Marianne Frostig were used to help with JJ's learning disabilities.
Reading has always been difficult for JJ. New or large words as well as skipping lines while reading
made comprehension very difficult. Information received aurally is currently the method by which he
does the majority of his learning. Spelling is at a third grade level so most of his writing is dictated to
someone else who types his work for him. This method has allowed the subject to excel in college and
eventually enter optometry school.
Presenting complaints and diagnosis of the case
It has a worldwide incidence of 5-20%. The incidence of dyslexia in India is believed to be 15%. According to the
Times of India, Jan 22, 2013, there are 228,994,454 students enrolled in recognized schools, which brings our
count of dyslexic Indian children to nearly 35 million.
Presenting complaints and diagnosis of the case
Karen’s mother Anna came to Commonwealth Learning Center when Karen was in the middle of second grade. Karen’s speech was remarkable for phoneme reversals –
She said the word breakfast as bress-ket , the word animal as aminal , and the word especially as peshasly. Karen had not made expected progress in reading during her first
grade year and her parents were growing restless with the Response to Intervention Model at the school. They decided to seek a private evaluation, and during the debrief
following the evaluation, the neuropsychologist suggested that they seek private tutoring. Anna and I met and talked about Karen’s likes and dislikes and how she felt about
possibly starting tutoring soon. This information is just as important as testing as it helps ensure a good teacher match and a smooth start to tutoring. I asked permission to
speak with the neuropsychologist given the absence of a written evaluation. (The report was forthcoming but Karen’s parents did not want to wait.) The neuropsychologist
described Karen as a lovely and bright child with severely compromised phonological awareness and rapid naming, hallmarks of dyslexia. Not surprisingly, her word attack
skills, word identification, and single-word spelling were also below the 16th percentile. Her spelling was not phonetic; in other words, she did not represent each sound of the
word with a letter. She wrote luc for lunch, bet for best, and sak for snack.
Karen began her twice weekly Orton-Gillingham tutorials the following week. She enjoyed the one-to-one time with her teacher and relished the opportunity to play games
that incorporated her interests – word cards with kitten stickers on the back and sentences written with purple marker. She wrote in sand and on shaving cream and in big
letters in the air. Her ability to read words and eventually books grew alongside her confidence. After six months, Karen had some benchmark testing. Her phonological
awareness was in the 42nd percentile and her word attack skills were now in the 34th percentile, but her word identification and spelling were below the 25th. This is
common. Word attack is measured by giving the child phonetically regular words (words that can be “sounded out”); many of them are single-syllable words. This is just what
she had been working on in tutoring. Word identification and spelling on most assessments is measured by giving a child a mix of phonetically regular and irregular words.
Karen continued with tutoring, learning syllable types, spelling generalizations, and syllable division strategies. Karen had another set of benchmark testing a year later, one
and a half years into tutoring, at the start of her fourth grade year. At that time, Karen was reading grade level text according to the Qualitative Reading Inventory. She had
solidly average word attack and word identification skills (both hovering around the 50th percentile). Karen had made gains in spelling; her mistakes were so much better!
She represented each sound she heard in words, but she had a terribly hard time knowing whether to spell compete as compeet, compete, or compete …They all sounded
right! The good news was that since Karen’s spelling mistakes were better, most of her errors were the type that could be corrected through spell check software. The other
area that lagged behind was Karen’s reading fluency – While her accuracy was fantastic (98% or more of the words read correctly), her rate was below expectations for grade
level. It is fairly common for students with dyslexia to read more slowly than their peers, and, for this reason, many access audiobooks when the reading load becomes too
heavy to carry without support. While Karen does not yet need this support as a fourth grader, it is likely that she will as she progresses through the grades.
Treatment given
● Learn to recognize and use the smallest sounds that make up words (phonemes).
● Understand that letters and strings of letters represent these sounds and words
(phonics).
● Understand what is read (comprehension).
● Read aloud to build reading accuracy, speed and expression (fluency).
● Build a vocabulary of recognized and understood word.
Case summary of Karen
Karen no longer attends tutoring during the school year, but she plans to return during the summers
to ensure that she maintains and improves upon the skills that she has worked so hard to obtain.
Oh, and she wants to talk to her tutor about her new favorite book series: The Chronicles of Narnia!
Conclusion
In conclusion, Taare zameen par is a compelling film that highlights the profound impact a teacher can
have on student’s life.
The director Amir Khan uses the metaphor ‘’Stars upon the ground ‘’ to enlighten audiences of the idea
that children are like stars in the world , and every child is special in his or her own way.
Bibliography
https://www.google.co.in
https://www.youtube.com/watch”
https://www.quora.com
https://en,wikipedia.org
https://www.britannica.com