Dyslexia Autumn 08 Cover

The Journal of The Dyslexia Guild Autumn 2008 Volume 20 Number 1 In this issue Assessment Practising Certificates: Renewal, CPD and APL Identification & Assessment Frameworks Supporting Vulnerable Learners in their Transition to Secondary School Dyslexia Review Autumn 2008, Volume 20 Number 1 Dyslexia Review The Journal of the Dyslexia Guild Editorial Contents page As anticipated and noted in our last journal, we have 4 Developing Language-appropriate Task been able to obtain a significant number of articles from Items for Identifying Literacy Difficulties people who contributed to the recent and very successful in Welsh-speaking Children BDA International Conference held in Harrogate. Further by Enlli Môn Thomas and Siân Wynn Lloyd articles from this conference are included here. I am very grateful to Barry Johnson for his work in obtaining and 10 Do Dyslexic Children’s Problems with the editing these articles. Ends of Words Suggest that Phonics Should be Taught in the Context of Real November saw the signing of the SEN Information Bill, Words? which will be known as the ‘Hodgson Act’, after the MP by Bernardine King, Clare Wood and who initiated this Private Member’s Bill. The good news Diane Rigg is that this will become law on 1 January 2009 and will oblige local authorities to provide information to the 16 Sense and Sensibility Secretary of State on SEN issues. Civil servants are now Identification & Assessment Frameworks: deliberating on the implementation of the act, but it will Institutional Practices, Processes and help all of us who want to improve services for children Dynamic Learning and Teaching by increasing transparency and local authority Environments accountability. by Geraldine A Price and Sandra Hargreaves These are busy times for all of us working in the Dyslexia Field. Sir Jim Rose is due to report on his 20 Assessment Practising Certificates: recommendations for the provision of dyslexic children in Renewal, CPD and APL the Spring, the significance of which cannot be by Margaret Rooms underestimated. At the same time the roll-out of the Inclusion Development Programme (IDP) continues to, 23 Creating Instructional Links to Learning: hopefully, make an impact on the practices in Engaging Students with Dyslexia Across mainstream education. the Curriculum by Andrew Stetkevich Editor 26 Supporting Vulnerable Learners in their Transition to Secondary School by Poppy Nash Editor: John Rack Editorial 31 Sporting Preferences and Achievements Committee: Steve Chinn of Dyslexic and Dyspraxic Sports Men Estelle Doctor John Rack and Women: Lessons for London 2012? Anne Sheddick by Dr David Grant Margaret Snowling 37 Psych’s Corner Mrs Jax de Action Dyslexia Review is published three times a year by Dyslexia Action 38 Book Reviews Park House, Wick Road, Egham, Surrey, TW20 0HH T 01784 222 300 www.dyslexiaaction.org.uk Cover: Photograph by Priscilla Maniez ©Dyslexia Action 3 Dyslexia Review Autumn 2008, Volume 20 Number 1 Developing language-appropriate task items for identifying literacy difficulties in Welsh-speaking children Enlli Môn Thomas and Siân Wynn Lloyd Abstract challenges to educators and therapists when trying to Although dyslexia is often associated with learners of assess a given child's developmental progression. opaque orthographic systems, children learning more transparent systems can also show persistent difficulties. In some cases, educators/therapists may want to This is often the case for Welsh-English bilinguals who compare a given child's linguistic performance against learn one opaque and one transparent system. This established age-matched norms as a quick and reliable paper outlines a series of tests that was developed to method of identifying whether a child's performance falls investigate Welsh-speaking children's performance on within or beyond the 'norm' for his/her age-group. specific items in Welsh in comparison to age-matched However, if the child is bilingual, tests normed on peers identified as having dyslexia. The results revealed monolingual samples are largely inappropriate. Yet, it is quantitative and qualitative differences between children often the case that bilingual children who are with dyslexia and children with no known language experiencing language difficulties are limited in terms of problems on these items. These data support the notion access to treatment procedures (eg, Cline & that there are language-specific items that can highlight Frederickson 1999), access to valid assessment tools in potential literacy problems, even in a transparent their native, non-English language (eg, Cotton, Crewther orthographic language like Welsh. & Crewther 2005, Cline 2000), and in terms of access to valid bilingual norms (eg, Gathercole & Thomas 2007, Background Gathercole, Thomas, & Hughes, in press). A number of It is widely recognised that specialist education studies have highlighted the need to test bilinguals in programmes and methods of measuring linguistic their two languages where bilingual norms are competence are commonly available, and are continually unavailable since testing in only one of a bilingual's being developed, in English. However, for many languages is likely to lead to the underestimation of the children, English is not their first or their 'home' child's abilities. Studies of vocabulary knowledge, for language. Rather, many children are learning English in example, have highlighted how the child's knowledge of addition to or alongside another language that deserves certain words is 'distributed' across their two languages equal consideration, exploration, and treatment. In the (see, eg, Oller & Eilers 2002), and other studies have UK, for example, there is a growing population of highlighted how bilinguals may initially perform below bilinguals who are developing English either as a second monolinguals on certain constructs at the very young or as an additional language, or simultaneously with ages, although they do eventually 'catch up' once they another language. One consequence of this is that receive the 'critical mass' of exposure necessary to learn many classrooms include a mixture of monolingual and those constructs (eg, Gathercole & Thomas 2005, bilingual children, some of whom are receiving their Gathercole, Laporte, & Thomas 2005, Oller & Eilers education in their 'dominant' language (or L1 - first 2002). language/mother tongue), others who are receiving most of their education in their 'less-dominant' language (often In terms of literacy, bilingual children often learn two their L2 - second language). Whilst most children in the typologically very different alphabetic systems. In Wales, UK receive their education through the medium of children are learning English - which operates a highly English, there is a growing number of children who are opaque orthographic system - alongside Welsh, which educated through a language other than English. In operates a relatively transparent (or 'shallow') Wales, for example, there is a long history of Welsh- orthographic system. Children who are receiving their medium and bilingual education, where recent figures education through the medium of Welsh are usually estimate that 1 in 5 children are receiving their education taught to read and write in Welsh, and studies have either wholly, mostly, or partially through the medium of shown that these children achieve better scores on Welsh (Lewis 2004). But regardless of whether the English reading tasks in comparison to children learning medium of instruction is in English or in Welsh, many to read in English (see Spencer & Hanley 2003). classrooms will contain a mixture of monolingual and Learning to read a transparent orthographic system, it bilingual children, with bilingual children of varying seems, accelerates later abilities in English. However, proficiency levels in their L1 and L2, providing major bilingual children learning one transparent and one 4 Dyslexia Review Autumn 2008, Volume 20 Number 1 opaque system who are suspected as having certain Table 1 shows the occurrence of similar examples of difficulties with literacy are likely to be formally identified incorrect vowel-grapheme clusters, geminate omissions, as having difficulties via testing in English since there is, and incorrect vowel selection as produced by a Welsh- at present, limited scope for profiling their equivalent speaking adult identified as dyslexic in late childhood. abilities in Welsh beyond the use of non-diagnostic reading tests that are often adaptations of existing Table 1: Spelling errors performed by first language English tasks. In addition, since dyslexia (as a Welsh-speaking adult identified as dyslexic in late 'phonological' disorder) is associated mostly with children childhood learning opaque orthographic systems, researchers have questioned whether aspects of dyslexia are specific to Welsh-speaking Target spelling Meaning languages with opaque orthographies, or to English in adult with dyslexia particular (eg, Aro & Wimmer 2003), which renders seisnag Saesneg 'English' assessment in transparent languages unnecessary. howsach haws(ach) 'easier' Recent evidence suggesting faster non-word reading darllan darllen 'to read' abilities by children learning languages other than cufla cyfle 'opportunity' English (eg, Aro & Wimmer 2003) partially supports such cumraeg Cymraeg 'Welsh' claims. However, children learning more transparent duddia dyddiau 'days' systems can also show persistent difficulties with reading daud dweud 'to say' and writing, and can display the

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