(Suburban Pittsburgh) School Board OKs Reading Research Project w/Optional MRI Testing of Children

From a July 15 Post-Gazette article (it doesn't mention the MRI aspect, nor does this July 6 article):

The four remedial reading programs aren't exactly household words in this part of the country, but they may provide the key to helping children catch up.

The Power4Kids Reading Initiative, started by the Haan Foundation for Children of San Francisco, yesterday announced the four programs that will be used for intensive remediation in a scientific study of slow readers in third and fifth grades in about 40 schools in Allegheny County. The names of the schools have not yet been announced, but about 60 applied.

At a news conference yesterday, Joseph Torgesen, the principal investigator, a professor of psychology and education at Florida State University, and director of the Florida Center for Reading Research, said the programs were chosen on the basis of their track records.

"We felt we weren't going to waste 100 hours of some child's time," he said.

The four programs, which have been on the market for years, are:

*Corrective Reading, published by Science Research Associates, which is part of McGraw Hill in Columbus, Ohio. This is the remedial part of the Direct Instruction technique, in which teachers use specific scripts. Direct Instruction already is being used to try to boost achievement in Clairton City schools.

*Failure Free Reading, designed for readers who can't seem to master phonics. The program doesn't depend on mastering phonics but instead emphasizes fluency and reading comprehension. In addition to the teacher, it uses the computer as a coach. It is based in Concord, N.C.

*Spell Read PAT (Phonemic Awareness Training) that began with a program for the deaf in Prince Edward Island, Canada, and focuses on precise ways to "decode" words. It works on both accuracy and fluency.

*Wilson Reading Method, which works on decoding skills as well as spelling. It is based in Milbury, Mass.

Torgesen said that the Failure Free Reading and Spell Read PAT take a broader approach, with word level understanding, accuracy, fluency and comprehension skills. He said the portions of the Wilson and Corrective Reading programs that are being used primarily emphasize accuracy and reading fluency. The three-year study is expected to cost nearly $9 million, including $4 million from the federal government and help from some other foundations, including the Heinz Endowments. Researchers describe the study, which will involve 800 children here and assistance from the Allegheny Intermediate Unit, as the largest of its type.

The participating children will be in the bottom 20 percent of readers. Of those chosen, 480 will receive one of the four strategies. The others will be in a control group and will receive whatever instruction and extra help they would have received otherwise.

Teachers, each of whom will be trained in one of the strategies, will work with the children in groups of three to try to bring them up to the average reading level in 100 hours of instruction.

Cinthia Haan, co-founder of the Haan Foundation, said she thinks the scientific study is the only way to find out what really works for children. She is looking for solutions that are highly effective, have results that can be repeated in various schools and are affordable.

Torgesen said some third- and fifth-graders are two years behind their grade levels. He expects the study will show that intensive help for older children will accelerate their reading growth quicker than is often the case. Those students must get more than a year's worth of growth in a year or they will never catch up.

The study also is intended to show which type of help is best for which type of student.

"All the programs work, but they don't work for all kids," said Joseph Lockavitch, president of Failure Free.

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I couldn't find any news articles about any metropolitan area other than Allegheny County involved in this program.

Please do the Burgh ping, martin.

I heard about this research project on Quinn's show the other day, and thought it sounded strange, like the children were guinea pigs. I don't have children, though, so I wonder what anyone else thinks.

A new study finds just three weeks of reading instruction can help improve the brain function in children with dyslexia.

It’s estimated 10 percent to 15 percent of school-aged children in the United States experience reading and spelling disabilities. Early diagnosis and proper treatment is crucial for these children. Researchers from the University of Washington in Seattle conducted a study to see if reading instruction would change the brain activity in children with dyslexia.

The children included in the study were diagnosed with dyslexia and had above average intelligence but scored 30-percent lower than average on standard reading tests. Those kids and a group of good readers underwent a functional MRI to look at the brain activity patterns during reading tests. The dyslexic children then underwent a three-week training program and all of the children had a second brain scan. The study was done during the summer to avoid conflict with what the children learned in school.

Researchers say the brain scans showed both the dyslexic children and the normal readers used the same specific parts of their brains to perform reading tasks. However, in the first brain scan the levels of activation in the brain were much weaker in the dyslexic children. This explains the poorer performance of these children. However, after the three-week reading program the levels of the brain activation were essentially the same in the two groups. Study authors say this indicates that instruction does not rewire the brain of the dyslexic child, but instead strengthens the normal circuits, which are already in use.

The study reports comprehensive reading instruction is beneficial to dyslexic children and associated with changes in brain function. Researchers say specialized instruction can help dyslexic children with some types of reading problems.
http://www.ivanhoe.com/channels/p_channelstory.cfm?storyid=6635

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This sounds like scientific research. Is it appropriate to use so many children in such a way? Consider that the environment will not be what one might consider a usual scientific laboratory environment, and the researchers will not be as closely linked as scientific researchers normally ar, nor will the experiment be controlled to the extent that good science might require.

Upper St Clair, Brentwood, Keystone Oaks, Bethel Park and Chartiers Valley?

The Haan Foundation for Children of San Francisco will direct the project, which is funded by the United States government and by foundations including the HEINZ ENDOWMENT?

MRI project is supervised by Marcel Just, director of the Center for Cognitive Brain Imaging at CARNEGIE MELLON UNIVERSITY ?

WHAT A JOKE ! Another waste of our money.

Brain Imaging=total BS

Children are not lab rats, I find this appalling.

Even if it's voluntary, the prospect of taking MRIs of children's brains smacks of keeping some sort of database to me.