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Published Online:https://doi.org/10.1024/2235-0977/a000122

Zusammenfassung. Kinder mit Schwierigkeiten im Lesen und Rechtschreiben haben es im schulischen Alltag besonders schwer. Sie in diesen Bereichen zu unterstützen und zu fördern, blieb bisher meist den Eltern überlassen, d. h. war auf den außerschulischen Bereich beschränkt. Dies ändert sich jedoch zunehmend und die Verantwortung zur Förderung wird mehr und mehr den Schulen übertragen. Im vorliegenden Artikel wird ein Pilotprojekt vorgestellt, in welchem Lernförderung für Kinder mit Lese-Rechtschreibschwächen innerschulisch durch Lerntherapeuten durchgeführt wurde. Das Projekt und seine Wirksamkeit werden im Kontext des „Response to Intervention“ – Ansatzes diskutiert.


In-school intervention for children with difficulties in reading and writing through external learning therapists

Abstract.Background: A serious amount of all primary school children in Germany seems to have difficulties in basic reading and writing skills. German practitioners usually differentiate between children who are, on the one hand, poor learners, whose results in basic scholastic achievement tests in reading and spelling are very low (prevalence 4 – 6 %, Fischbach et al., 2013), and on the other hand, children with learning disorders according to ICD10 (WHO, 2005) (prevalence 2 – 4%, Fischbach et al., 2013). The ICD-10 classification implies that children with learning disorders do not only perform below average but also show a large discrepancy between their low achievement and their much higher intellectual ability. This IQ-discrepancy criterion is controversial because poor learners do not differ from children with learning disorders in symptomatic, cognitive deficits, social-emotional consequences and therapeutic responsiveness (e. g. Mähler & Schuchardt, 2011). Reading and writing difficulties and subsequent experiences of failure often result in mental illnesses such as anxiety and depression (Roth & Warnke, 2001). If there is no support for these children their school career and job history may be seriously impaired (Schulte-Körne & Remschmidt, 2003). Without an appropriate intervention, reading and writing difficulties persist in many cases until adulthood (Landerl & Wimmer, 2008). There are, however, many restrictions to appropriate support: There is no funding by the responsible authority, unless reading and writing difficulties are already severe and show the full-blown clinical picture of a learning disorder. Moreover intervention has to be in the child's leisure time and may lead to stigmatization. Because of new regulations in the context of inclusive learning, schools now have to reorganize classes to support each child in its own special and individual needs for learning. One model of intervention is the response-to-intervention-model (RTI), a treatment-oriented diagnostic process to provide early and systematic assistance for children with learning difficulties. The RTI-model starts with an early diagnostic screening for all children of one class. Those who show difficulties, although they attend to regular classroom instruction, receive intervention in small groups by teachers for special education or teaching therapists. If they do not respond to this intervention, the next step is individual therapy. Thus RTI prevents academic failure through early intervention, and children do not have to wait until they meet diagnostic criteria of learning disorders to be supported. Aims: In line with these RTI- ideas the LeFiS-project offers special support for children with difficulties in reading and writing (LeFiS stands for in-school intervention for children with reading and writing difficulties) and was developed by a team of the youth welfare office of Hildesheim and the Psychological Institute of the University of Hildesheim. The current study was designed to find out whether children benefit sufficiently from such an in-school intervention to overcome their reading and/or writing difficulties. Of further interest is whether children with isolated difficulties (either reading or writing problems) benefit in the same way from the intervention as children with combined difficulties (reading and writing) and whether there are differential effects for children with learning difficulties with or without IQ-achievement-discrepancy criterion (ICD10). Methods: The reading and spelling performances of all children were first tested with standardized German achievement tests, intellectual abilities were assessed by a nonverbal IQ-test. During the assessment period children of nine schools were at the end of 2nd grade. In the intervention group 97 children with isolated and combined reading and writing difficulties took part in the study, and the control group consisted of 72 children, who had the same difficulties but did not receive any intervention. Children in the control group were similar to the intervention group in age, gender and IQ, and they were tested at the same time with the same tests but in a cooperating project. The children of the intervention group were divided into small groups that received intensive support by a learning therapist two hours a week during the third and fourth year at school (a total amount of 60 hours of learning therapy). The intervention concepts and strategies of the therapists varied across the different schools. Results: The results of this study show advantages of the intervention group compared to the control group especially in writing. In total more than twice as many trained children compared to the control group could overcome their learning difficulties and achieve results in the average range. With regard to reading there were no significant results of the intervention because both groups could increase their reading performance. Independently from the intervention, findings show that children with combined difficulties achieve lower scores than children with isolated difficulties, and children with learning disorders show a lower performance than those without IQ-discrepancy. This study reveals a distinct influence of the intervention on children with combined difficulties in the second half of intervention time. While children of the control group with combined difficulties showed a declining performance over time compared to other children of the same grade, trained children could stabilize their primarily increased performance. Nevertheless, their performance did not achieve the average range. Children with isolated difficulties could also benefit from the intervention but their advantage was not statistically relevant. Furthermore a difference was found for children with and without IQ-discrepancy: only children with learning difficulties without discrepancy could benefit from the intervention. In line with the findings for the children with combined difficulties, this result shows: the worse the performance, the harder to overcome the difficulties, even with the help of intervention. Discussion: Concerning the intervention on reading performance no effects were found in this study. One reason for this might be the chosen reading test ELFE 1 – 6, which measures only reading comprehension and speed, but not the ability of reading aloud and precisely. It cannot be ruled out, that there are effects of intervention in these aspects, which did not show up. Looking at means of the intervention group in contrast to the control group, it is obvious, that both groups increase their performance in reading and writing. This shows one problem of the chosen control group. For organizational reasons children of the control group came from Hessen, another state in Germany. The children of the control group did not receive any external learning therapy (this was recorded), but it is possible that these children were supported in school by their teachers. Therefore, the effects of LeFiS-intervention would be more obvious in contrast to control group, which surely had no extra support at all. In summary, it can be concluded that an in-school intervention like LeFiS is an effective way to support some children with reading and writing difficulties and it relieves parents and teachers. But especially children with severe difficulties and learning disorders cannot get along without individual therapy over a long time. It is of great importance to provide both, in-school group intervention as well as individual learning therapy in line with the RTI-model. Inclusive education is a challenge for all people involved, but if all participants show their readiness for new structures it can be a true enrichment. Taking the serious amount of children with reading and writing difficulties into account, it might also be necessary in the near future to plan interventions in line with RTI within the educational system from the very beginning. This seems to be the best possibility to prevent later academic failure.

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