Professional Documents
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Research-Based Reading Interventions for Students with Dyslexia and Other Reading
Disabilities
Katie Hearl
SPED 637
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Abstract
This is a literature review of ten peer-reviewed journals on interventions in three specific areas in
reading for students who have dyslexia or other learning and/or reading disabilities. Students
who have dyslexia or other learning and/or reading disabilities have difficulty in the areas of
phonemic awareness, phonics, vocabulary, fluency, and text comprehension. The subtopics of
this review include written expression, reading comprehension strategies and skills, and
vocabulary. In general, researchers found that students respond to interventions that are delivered
with explicit and systematic instruction. It was concluded that many students who have dyslexia
or other learning and/or reading disabilities need interventions in text production skills in order
comprehension strategies yielded better results. Researchers found that students are more
interventions are used. Some of the implications for teachers, literacy specialists, and other
educational professionals include explicitly teaching students to use multiple reading strategies
before, during, and after reading, explicitly teaching students how to break down words into
word parts to determine unknown meanings, and to give enough time to interventions before
determining if the intervention is a success or a failure. When used with fidelity, these
research-based reading interventions may help students with dyslexia or other learning
disabilities make positive gains in deficit areas so that they can become successful readers.
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Research-Based Reading Interventions for Students with Dyslexia and Other Reading
Disabilities
In today’s modern education system, teachers serve the needs of students from many
different populations. Students with learning disabilities, reading deficits, and/or dyslexia often
are in need of interventions for various areas in reading. According to Gough and Tunmer
(1986), readers can be classified into one of four subtypes: difficulty with code based and
meaning based, difficulty with code based, difficulty with meaning based, and proficient.
Students either have poor decoding and poor comprehension, poor decoding and good
comprehension, good decoding and poor comprehension, or both good decoding and
comprehension.
Students who have dyslexia often fall into the poor decoding and poor comprehension or
poor decoding and good comprehension subtype. Students with dyslexia generally have trouble
with decoding words and phonological awareness, which may lead to problems with vocabulary,
reading comprehension, and writing fluency skills. Students who have other learning disabilities
or reading disabilities can struggle with any area of reading: phonics, vocabulary, fluency,
reading comprehension, etc. According to Costa, Edwards, and Hooper (2016), “It is estimated
that reading disabilities make up approximately 80% of all total learning disabilities” (p. 18).
Students who have dyslexia, learning disabilities, and/or reading disabilities need strategic,
Statement of Problem
The three areas of exploration include written expression, reading comprehension skills
and strategies, and vocabulary. While students at every grade level utilize knowledge and skills
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in all three of these areas, these areas tend to be emphasized more in the upper grade levels.
Students who have learning disabilities or reading difficulties may struggle with these abilities,
as these are foundational skills across all content curriculums in grades 4-12. Students should not
crucial that teachers, literacy specialists, and professionals know what to do to support students
with learning disabilities and/or reading deficits in order to help the student become the most
successful he or she can be. Research-based practices and interventions in all areas of reading
Method
An electronic search was conducted using the EBSCOHost search engine through the
University of Hawaii library. The ERIC, Academic Search Complete, and Professional
Development Collection databases were used. The search terms for these articles included
dyslexia, learning disabilities, reading deficits, reading disabilities, writing interventions, written
review, articles must have been peer- reviewed, intervention-based, and conducted within the
past ten years. A total of eight empirical, peer-reviewed studies and two meta-analyses were
included.
Written Expression
Rigby-Willis (2017) categorize “students’ text production skills, self-regulation strategies for
carrying out writing processes, knowledge about writing, and motivation to write” (p. 200) as
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important characteristics of written expression. Students who have dyslexia and other learning
and reading disabilities often struggle with written expression because writing is such a complex
process with many intricate moving parts. Students need to be able to execute proper
handwriting, spelling, grammar, sentence fluency, and logical content, as well as plan, draft,
how written expression compares between students with learning and reading disabilities and
their typically achieving peers. Researchers established that students with learning and reading
disabilities do not reach the same level of mastery in regards to the areas of written expression as
their typically achieving peers. The study conducted by Viel-Ruma, Houchins, Jolivette,
Fredrick, and Gama (2010) sought to determine if direct instruction used as a form of
intervention in written expression was beneficial to secondary students with learning disabilities.
Researchers included students with learning and reading disabilities who were both native and
non-native English speakers to see if the direct instruction intervention strategy was transferable
to multiple populations. In conclusion, results were varied, but showed positive gains.
Effectiveness of interventions
Both the meta-analysis and the article discussed the effectiveness of the interventions
used. While students did make positive gains and seemed to respond well to the interventions,
researchers felt like they were unable to definitively conclude that it was due to the type of
intervention, rather than students just receiving any type of intervention. Viel-Ruma et al. (2010)
concluded that while all participants in their study showed positive gains, “because both the rate
of the immediacy and the strength of the magnitude of the effect are indicators of the
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viewed with caution” (p. 105). Likewise, Graham et al. (2017) made similar claims:
Although the overall quality of studies was not so strong that we can make absolute
statements about our findings, we do not think that the limitations of the studies reviewed
invalidate the basic findings that students with LD experience greater challenges with
increase the time students received the interventions. In some studies, “Instruction lasted for 5
weeks” (Viel-Ruma et al., 2010, p.98), some less than that. In order to determine definitively if it
was the specific intervention that was successful rather than simply students receiving any type
intervention, more time should have been given, especially to accommodate students with
Both the article and meta-analysis looked at students’ text production skills. According to
Graham et al. (2017), text production skills include “sentence fluency, handwriting, spelling, and
grammar” (p. 200). These conventions of writing are important for students to understand and
utilize. Viel-Ruma et al. (2010) also looked at text production skills in so much that “The
program comprises components that address mechanics (including capitalization, use of commas
and quotation marks), sentence writing (including punctuation and use of introductory
phrases)…” (p. 100). By looking at this area of writing, researchers were able to draw
conclusions about students with learning disabilities and some of the interventions used to
strengthen text production skills. Graham et al. (2017) found that “…students with LD
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(p. 210). Overall, students with dyslexia, and learning and/or reading disabilities need
interventions that increase text production skills in order to be successful in other areas of written
expression.
Reading comprehension is the ability for a student to understand and make logical sense
of what he or she reads. Students who have learning disabilities or reading difficulties can have
problems with reading comprehension, especially if they have deficits in other areas of reading.
Boardman et al. (2016) focused on teaching specific reading strategies for students with
learning disabilities, particularly those with reading disabilities. The research supported
explicitly teaching struggling readers a specific reading strategy, how to use it, when to use it
appropriately, and why it is important. Students used these strategies before, during, and after
reading in order to access and comprehend the text. Boon, Hintz, and Cornelius-Freyre (2015)
focused on the effectiveness of one specific intervention (story mapping) to help improve
reading comprehension for students with learning disabilities, including dyslexia, in grades 6-12.
The research supported that story mapping is a beneficial reading strategy to improve reading
comprehension. Finally, Snowling and Hulme (2012) looked at several intervention strategies for
students with dyslexia and other reading comprehension impairments. Students who received
Setting
All three articles included where the interventions took place, which was inside the
classroom. Some of the studies reported using inclusion classrooms, while others used
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self-contained special education classroom settings. This is important to note because in order for
teachers to actually utilize the intervention strategies, they need to be able to replicate the
findings of the studies in their own classrooms. Because these studies were actually conducted in
classrooms, it makes the findings and results much more transferable and easier to duplicate for
teachers.
The research found the importance of teaching students multiple text comprehension
strategies. In the findings, researchers concluded that students needed to be exposed to and have
direct practice with multiple reading comprehension strategies. Strategies should be used at
various points while reading text. According to Boardman et al. (2016), “Students use before,
during, and after reading strategies during CSR to access challenging text” (p. 411). Stopping at
different points throughout the text allowed students to utilize different reading strategies for
comprehension.
The data from Snowling and Hulme (2012) also supported the claim that multiple
strategies should be used. In their study, students were placed into three groups. One received
only intervention in reading, the second group only received intervention in phonological
awareness, and the third received interventions for both reading and phonological awareness.
Snowling and Hulme (2012) found that “At the end of the 20 weeks of intervention the children
who received the combined programme (R+P) were significantly ahead of the other three groups
in reading accuracy, spelling, and reading comprehension” (pg. 29). Students who are taught
multiple strategies to use when reading were able to make more significant gains than those
Vocabulary
Vocabulary is an area that is crucial for reading comprehension, especially in the upper
grade levels. Students need to know, understand, and be able to determine meaning of unknown
words in order to comprehend what they are reading. Specific interventions can lead to gains in
vocabulary knowledge.
Brown, Lignugaris, and Forbush (2016) researched the effects of morphemic vocabulary
intervention in middle school students with learning disabilities. The two studies were comprised
of explicit instruction as an intervention strategy where students were taught to identify roots and
prefixes and how to use those word parts in sentences. Overall, the interventions helped increase
both vocabulary knowledge and reading comprehension. In their meta-analysis, Goodwin and
Ahn (2010) looked at the data behind 17 independent studies to determine the effect of
morphological interventions for students with literacy difficulties, including those with dyslexia.
Studies showed that some students with dyslexia use morphology as a strategy to compensate for
reading deficits and therefore, strategic morphological interventions would be beneficial to those
students. Harris, Schumaker, and Deshler (2011) researched the effectiveness of the Word
Mapping condition and the Vocabulary (LINCS) Strategy as interventions for students both with
and without learning disabilities. They found that the students who received both intervention
strategies scored higher than those in other test groups. Overall, the studies showed that there are
greater gains and improvements in vocabulary development and reading in general when
Participants in studies
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In all three journal articles, the age group researchers were working with was similar.
Students who participated in the studies were in the upper grade level band (4th-12th). There are
several reasons for this. Students who are in the 4th-12th grade range are no longer in reading
programs that teach them to read and are not explicitly learning to read. Rather, students in these
grades are reading to learn; content across the curriculum is presented largely through text and
reading. Students in the upper grade band also tended to respond better to morphological
interventions. Harris et al. (2011) found that “Additionally, the researchers showed that student
knowledge of morphology was greater in students enrolled in grade four than in younger grades
and continued to improve across the grades” (p. 19). Reading instruction in these grades tends to
One of the main themes in all three studies was the focus placed on morphological
instruction and interventions. Students who are in the upper grade level band often come across
unknown vocabulary words that are made up of word parts. Goodwin and Ahn (2010) found that
“breaking down complex words into morpheme components allows the reader to decode and
access the meaning of larger words” (p. 186). All three articles argue that by explicitly teaching
the meanings of the word parts and how to use the words in context, students are then able to
determine the meaning of the whole word. The explicit teaching of word parts include instruction
morphological interventions shows that morphological interventions are successful, with the
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level of success differing depending on the literacy outcome (p. 203). Brown et al. (2016)
achieved similar results in their studies: “All participants clearly increased their word knowledge
skills to derive the meaning of untaught prefixed words” (p. 328). Harris et al. (2011) used a
multiple strategies approach with morphemic intervention and found that “the interventions were
effective in teaching the strategies…” (p. 29). Overall, students with learning disabilities and
reading deficits benefited and made from strategic morphological interventions, thus making it
an effective intervention.
Through the research, it is clear that there are many implications for teachers and
practitioners to help students with dyslexia, learning disabilities, and/or reading disabilities. One
takeaway for teachers is that direct and explicit morphological instruction and interventions are
effective. When designing vocabulary instruction, teachers should keep in mind that teaching
prefixes, suffixes, and root words help students break down whole words into word parts and
determine the meaning based on those parts. Another takeaway for teachers and practitioners is
that teaching students multiple reading comprehension strategies improves their comprehension
of the text. By teaching students multiple strategies, they are able to utilize and apply the ones
that work for them or that are appropriate to the style of text. One last takeaway for teachers is to
ensure that they are giving enough time to try interventions before concluding that it is a failure
Overall, the most important concept for teachers to gain from the literature is not just
specific interventions, but rather how they can refine their practice and teaching as a whole. The
most important takeaway for teachers is to ensure that they are delivering lessons that explicitly
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and systematically teach elements of reading. This is a theme that was emphasized through the
majority of the journal articles and other related works such as the International Dyslexia
Association Standards (2010) and literature by the National Institute for Literacy, regardless of
the specific reading topic. In general, students who were receiving direct instruction and
intervention performed better and made more positive gains than students who did not receive
using, it should involve direct instruction in a way that is explicit to students and systematically
taught. In conclusion, in order to help students with dyslexia and learning and/or reading
implement research-based interventions and practices that will help students be the most
References
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Brown, S., Lignugaris, B., & Forbush, D. (2016). The effects of morphemic vocabulary
students with learning disabilities. Education and Treatment of Children, 39, 301-338.
Costa, L., Edwards, C., & Hooper, S. (2016). Writing disabilities and reading disabilities in
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Graham, S., Collins, A., & Rigby-Willis, H. (2017). Writing characteristics of students with
Harris, M., Schumaker, J., & Deshler, D. (2011). Analysis instruction on the vocabulary
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