Home literacy predictors of early reading development in children with cerebral palsy

The goal of the present 1-year long longitudinal study was to determine which home literacy variables were effective in stimulating early reading skills of children with cerebral palsy (CP) directly or indirectly via the reading precursors. Parents of 35 children with CP completed questionnaires regarding aspects of the home literacy environment (HLE). The reading precursors: Vocabulary, Syntactic skills and phonological awareness, i.e., Rhyme and Phonemic awareness, were assessed at the end of Kindergarten and the end of Grade 1, while the early reading skills Letter knowledge and Word recognition were assessed only at the end of Grade 1. Three HLE variables were found to be related to reading precursors and early reading skills: Parent literacy mediation, Word orientation and Story orientation activities during shared book reading. Path analyses showed that these three HLE variables were not directly related to early reading skills in Grade 1, but indirectly via the reading precursors, in particular phonological awareness.     

The development of word recognition,sentence comprehension,word spelling,and vocabulary in children with deafness: A longitudinal study

BackgroundOnly a small number of longitudinal studies have been conducted to assess the literacy skills of children with hearing impairment. The results of these studies are inconsistent with regard to the importance of phonology in reading acquisition as is the case in studies with hearing children. Colin, Magnan, Ecalle, and Leybaert (2007) revealed the important role of early phonological skills and the contribution of the factor of age of exposure to Cued Speech (CS: a manual system intended to resolve the ambiguities inherent to speechreading) to subsequent reading acquisition (from kindergarten to first grade) in children with deafness. The aim of the present paper is twofold: (1) to confirm the role of early exposure to CS in the development of the linguistic skills necessary in order to learn reading and writing in second grade; (2) to reveal the possible existence of common factors other than CS that may influence literacy performances and explain the inter-individual difference within groups of children with hearing impairment.MethodEighteen 6-year-old hearing-impaired and 18 hearing children of the same chronological age were tested from kindergarten to second grade. The children with deafness had either been exposed to CS at an early age, at home and before kindergarten (early-CS group), or had first been exposed to it when they entered kindergarten (late-CS group) or first grade (beginner-CS group). Children were given implicit and explicit phonological tasks, silent reading tasks (word recognition and sentence comprehension), word spelling, and vocabulary tasks.ResultsChildren in the early-CS group outperformed those of the late-CS and beginner-CS groups in phonological tasks from first grade to second grade. They became better readers and better spellers than those from the late-CS group and the beginner-CS group. Their performances did not differ from those of hearing children in any of the tasks except for the receptive vocabulary test. Thus early exposure to CS seems to permit the development of linguistic skills necessary in order to learn reading and writing. The possible contribution of other factors to the acquisition of literacy skills by children with hearing impairment will be discussed.     

The role of phonological awareness and letter-sound knowledge in the reading development of children with intellectual disabilities

Our study investigated if phonological awareness and letter-sound knowledge were predictors of reading progress in children with intellectual disabilities (ID) with unspecified etiology. An academic achievement test was administered to 129 children with mild or moderate ID when they were 6–8 years old, as well as one and two school years later. Findings indicated that phonological awareness and letter-sound knowledge at 6–8 years of age predicted progress in word and non-word reading after one school year and two school years after controlling for IQ, age, expressive vocabulary, spoken language, and type of placement. Phonological awareness and letter-sound knowledge at 6–8 years of age also predicted progress in reading comprehension after one school year and two school years. These findings suggest that training phonological awareness skills combined with explicit phonics instruction is important to foster reading progress in children with mild and moderate ID with unspecified etiology.     

From numeracy to arithmetic: Precursors of arithmetic performance in children with cerebral palsy from 6 till 8 years of age

Children with cerebral palsy (CP) are generally delayed in arithmetic compared to their peers. The development of early numeracy performance in children with CP is not yet evident, nor have the factors associated with change over time been identified. Therefore, we examined the development of numeracy in children with CP over a two year period and studied which cognitive factors were predictive of arithmetic performance. A longitudinal study with three measurement waves separated by one year was conducted. 56 children participated (37 boys, M = 6.0 years, SD = .58). Standardized tasks were used to assess verbal- and visual–spatial working memory, executive functioning, fine motor skills and early numeracy performance. In addition, experimental tasks were developed to measure counting and arithmetic. The results showed that early numeracy performance of children with CP increased between 6 and 8 years of age. Structural equation modelling showed that early numeracy was strongly related to arithmetic performance at the consecutive year. Working memory, counting and fine motor skills were all positively related to early numeracy performance a year later. Furthermore, working memory and fine motor skills were precursors of the development of early numeracy. Considering the importance of numeracy and arithmetic in daily life and in academic and work success, children with CP could substantially benefit from intervention programs aimed at increasing working memory and early numeracy performance.     

Emergent literacy activities, instructional adaptations and school absence of children with cerebral palsy in special education

The goal of the present study was to get an overview of the emergent literacy activities, instructional adaptations and school absence of children with cerebral palsy (CP) compared to normally developing peers. The results showed that there were differences between the groups regarding the amount of emergent literacy instruction. While time dedicated to storybook reading and independent picture-book reading was comparable, the children with CP received fewer opportunities to work with educational software and more time was dedicated to rhyming games and singing. For the children with CP, the level of speech, intellectual, and physical impairments were all related to the amount of time in emergent literacy instruction. Additionally, the amount of time reading precursors is trained and the number of specific reading precursors that is trained is all related to skills of emergent literacy.     

Screening for mathematical disabilities in kindergarten

Objective: This article is devoted to the potential early markers for mathematical learning disabilities in kindergarten in order to prevent children from falling further behind and from developing unrecognized mathematical disabilities later on.

Methods: Performances in preparatory arithmetic tasks were studied in 361 kindergartners focusing on differences between children at risk for mathematical disabilities and children who were at least moderately achieving in numerical arithmetic tasks.

Results: Evidence was found for several markers in kindergarten. Children at risk had lower scores on procedural counting knowledge, conceptual counting knowledge, seriation, classification, conservation and magnitude comparison tasks. Based on these kindergarten abilities, 77% of children who were at risk for mathematical disabilities could be detected.

Conclusion: Procedural and conceptual counting knowledge, seriation and classification skills and magnitude comparison abilities could possibly serve as powerful early screeners in the detection of mathematical disabilities.     

Effects of phonological awareness and naming speed on mathematics skills in children with mild intellectual disabilities

Abstract

Objective: Both phonological awareness (PA) and naming speed have been identified as two skills related to the development of mathematics skills for children with and without learning disabilities. The purpose of the present study was to investigate the relationships between PA and colour naming speed for 265 elementary school students with mild intellectual disabilities (MID).

Methods: Participants were assessed using the Comprehensive Test of Phonological Processes and the KeyMath Revised Diagnostic Inventory of Essential Mathematics.

Results: Hierarchical regression analyses accounting for the effects of age indicated that children with MID rely on both PA and naming speed when solving mathematics problems, although PA was the more robust indicator of the two.

Conclusion: As a whole, these results suggest that children with intellectual disabilities evidence the same types of reading and math relationships as shown for other populations of children.     

Impact of motor skills on cognitive test results in very-low-birthweight children

Standardized tests that are frequently used to evaluate the cognitive development of very-low-birthweight children often appear to measure motor ability as well as cognitive skills. To estimate the impact of motor skills on individual test performance among very-low-birthweight children of kindergarten age, we employed factor analysis in a sample of 298 very-low-birthweight children that included severely disabled children. Using a test battery designed to measure concentration, language skills, overall cognitive development, visuomotor abilities, and memory, we identified two factors in each of three diagnostic subgroups: unimpaired children (n = 184), clumsy children (n = 56), and children with cerebral palsy (n = 33). Based on the pattern of factor loadings, we interpret the first factor as capturing language and overall cognitive abilities, whereas the second factor appears to capture motor abilities. Language skills explained 49% and motor abilities accounted for 16% of the overall variance of the individual test results. Among children with attention deficit (n = 25), a third factor emerged. In these children, we interpret the first factor as capturing language or cognitive skills, the second as representing visuomotor skills, and the third as a quantifier of the ability to concentrate. The test battery tested the same abilities in impaired and unimpaired children; however, these were not always the abilities that the battery aimed to test. Future studies need to evaluate whether factor scores only for cognitive but not motor abilities might be useful outcome variables.     

Emergent literacy skills,behavior problems and familial antecedents of reading difficulties: A follow-up study of reading achievement from kindergarten to fifth grade

This study examined the relation between emergent literacy skills, teachers’ reports of behavioral problems, and word reading achievement in a community sample of French students. Family background was investigated and included familial antecedents of reading difficulties (Fa/Rd) and parents’ educational level. The analyses explored the pattern of concurrent relations between behavioral, familial and emergent literacy measures in a sample of 812 preschoolers, and their predictive power in explaining word reading achievement in a sub-sample of 150 children followed from kindergarten to fifth grade. Word reading at fifth grade was predicted by kindergarten measures of phonological awareness and letter knowledge. Teachers’ reports of inattention symptoms at each grade level were associated with early reading skills and with subsequent word reading. Fa/Rd were concurrently and longitudinally associated with emergent literacy skills, teachers’ reported inattention and word reading. These results indicate that children with a family history of reading difficulties are at increased risk for the co-occurrence of reading difficulties and attention problems from kindergarten onward. These findings confirm the shared influence of Fa/Rd on the comorbidity between inattention symptoms and reading difficulties in a non-diagnosed community sample of preschool children followed through late elementary school.     

Sleep in children with cerebral palsy: a review

Children with neurodevelopmental disabilities, such as cerebral palsy, are considered to be a population at risk for the occurrence of sleep problems. Moreover, recent studies on children with cerebral palsy seem to indicate that this population is at higher risk for sleep disorders. The importance of the recognition and treatment of sleep problems in children with cerebral palsy cannot be overemphasized. It is well known that the consequences of sleep disorders in children are broad and affect both the child and family. This review article explores the types and possible risk factors associated with the development of sleep problems in children with cerebral palsy and the impact of this disorder on the child and family. In addition, a brief summary of current diagnostic and treatment modalities is provided. Finally, the characteristics, diagnostic techniques, and management of sleep-related breathing disorders in children with cerebral palsy are discussed.     

Consultation in paediatric rehabilitation for behaviour problems in young children with cerebral palsy and/or developmental delay

To measure the effectiveness of consultation for behaviour problems in a paediatric rehabilitation setting, this paper used longitudinal assessment of children who received the intervention through their regularly scheduled appointments with their Occupational Therapist (OT), Physical Therapist (PT) or Speech and Language Pathologist (SLP) at three paediatric rehabilitation clinics in Columbia, South Carolina. The participants were 86 children with cerebral palsy (CP), developmental delay (DD) and medical conditions, ages 1-6 years, and their families. The intervention consisted of monthly meetings between rehabilitation therapists and a team consisting of a Child Psychiatrist, Developmental Pediatrician, Psychologists and a Preventive Medicine specialist. There were statistically significant improvements in the sub-scales of the Vineland adaptive skills assessment and the measures of family stress associated with the parent's attitude toward the child with a disability. The magnitude of the improvement was greatest for children with Mental Development Indices (MDI) less than 50. This assessment of young children with disabilities demonstrates the effectiveness of a consultation model in improving adaptive behaviour and parent attitude about their child.     

Literacy after cerebral hemispherectomy: Can the isolated right hemisphere read?

ObjectivesCerebral hemispherectomy, a surgical procedure undergone to control intractable seizures, is becoming a standard procedure with more cases identified and treated early in life [33]. While the effect of the dominant hemisphere resection on spoken language has been extensively researched, little is known about reading abilities in individuals after left-sided resection. Left-lateralized phonological abilities are the key components of reading, i.e., grapheme–phoneme conversion skills [1]. These skills are critical for the acquisition of word-specific orthographic knowledge and have been shown to predict reading levels in average readers as well as in readers with mild cognitive disability [26]. Furthermore, impaired phonological processing has been implicated as the cognitive basis in struggling readers. Here, we explored the reading skills in participants who have undergone left cerebral hemispherectomy.MethodsSeven individuals who have undergone left cerebral hemispherectomy to control intractable seizures associated with perinatal infarct have been recruited for this study. We examined if components of phonological processing that are shown to reliably separate average readers from struggling readers, i.e., phonological awareness, verbal memory, speed of retrieval, and size of vocabulary, show the same relationship to reading levels when they are mediated by the right hemisphere [2].ResultsWe found that about 60% of our group developed both word reading and paragraph reading in the average range. Phonological processing measured by both phonological awareness and nonword reading was unexpectedly spared in the majority of participants. Phonological awareness levels strongly correlated with word reading. Verbal memory, a component of phonological processing skills, together with receptive vocabulary size, positively correlated with reading levels similar to those reported in average readers. Receptive vocabulary, a bilateral function, was preserved to a certain degree similar to that of strongly left-lateralized phonological skills [3]. Later seizure onset was associated with better reading levels.ConclusionsWhen cerebral hemispherectomy is performed to control seizures associated with very early (in utero) insult, it has been found that the remaining right hemisphere is still able to support reading and phonological processing skills that are normally mediated by the left hemisphere. Our results also suggest the existence of variability in individuals after hemispherectomy, even within groups having the same etiology and similar timing of insult.     

Precursors to numeracy in kindergartners with specific language impairment

The present study investigated to what extent children with specific language impairment (SLI) differ in their early numeracy skills, when compared to normal language achieving (NLA) children. It was also explored which precursors were related to the early numeracy skills in both groups. Sixty-one children with SLI (6; 1 years) and 111 NLA children (6; 2 years) were assessed on general intelligence, working memory, naming speed, linguistic ability and early numeracy skills. The results showed lower scores for the children with SLI on logical operations and numeral representations but not on numeral estimations. The variance in numeral estimations was explained by children's intelligence and visual spatial memory. Phonological awareness and grammatical ability explained the variance in logical operations and numeral representations whereas naming speed turned out to be an additional factor in predicting these early numeracy skills of children with SLI.     

Objective test of the quality of motor function of children with cerebral palsy: preliminary study

An objective test of motor function would enable better evaluation of various treatment programmes for children with cerebral palsy. The use of tri-axial accelerometry was investigated in 36 children with cerebral palsy and in 53 children without disabilities. Variables discriminated well between able-bodied and disabled children, and there was a high level of retest reliability. The technique requires further development, but shows promise of providing the ability to gather objective data about the quality of motor function.     

Gait analysis of children with spastic hemiplegic cerebral palsy

An experiment was carried out in the key laboratory for Technique Diagnosis and Function Assessment of Winter Sports of China to investigate the differences in gait characteristics between healthy children and children with spastic hemiplegic cerebral palsy.With permission of their parents,200 healthy children aged 3 to 6 years in the kindergarten of Northeastern University were enrolled in this experiment.Twenty children aged 3 to 6 years with spastic hemiplegic cerebral palsy from Shengjing Hospital,China were also enrolled in this experiment.Standard data were collected by simultaneously recording gait information from two digital cameras.DVracker was used to analyze the standard data.The children with hemiplegic cerebral palsy had a longer gait cycle,slower walking speed,and longer support phase than did the healthy children.The support phase was longer than the swing phase in the children with hemiplegic cerebral palsy.There were significant differences in the angles of the hip,knee,and ankle joint between children with cerebral palsy and healthy children at the moment of touching the ground and buffering,and during pedal extension.Children with hemiplegic cerebral palsy had poor motor coordination during walking,which basically resulted in a short stride,high stride frequency to maintain speed,more obvious swing,and poor stability.     

Early motor development and later language and reading skills in children at risk of familial dyslexia

Relationships between early motor development and language and reading skills were studied in 154 children, of whom 75 had familial risk of dyslexia (37 females, 38 males; at-risk group) and 79 constituted a control group (32 females, 47 males). Motor development was assessed by a structured parental questionnaire during the child's first year of life. Vocabulary and inflectional morphology skills were used as early indicators of language skills at 3 years 6 months and 5 years or 5 years 6 months of age, and reading speed was used as a later indicator of reading skills at 7 years of age. The same subgroups as in our earlier study (in which the cluster analysis was described) were used in this study. The three subgroups of the control group were 'fast motor development', 'slow fine motor development', and 'slow gross motor development', and the two subgroups of the at-risk group were 'slow motor development' and 'fast motor development'. A significant difference was found between the development of expressive language skills. Children with familial risk of dyslexia and slow motor development had a smaller vocabulary with poorer inflectional skills than the other children. They were also slower in their reading speed at the end of the first grade at the age of 7 years. Two different associations are discussed, namely the connection between early motor development and language development, and the connection between early motor development and reading speed.     

Neural processing of vision and language in kindergarten is associated with prereading skills and predicts future literacy

The main objective of this longitudinal study was to investigate the neural predictors of reading acquisition. For this purpose, we followed a sample of 54 children from the end of kindergarten to the end of second grade. Preliterate children were tested for visual symbol (checkerboards, houses, faces, written words) and auditory language processing (spoken words) using a passive functional magnetic resonance imaging paradigm. To examine brain–behavior relationships, we also tested cognitive–linguistic prereading skills at kindergarten age and reading performance of 48 of the same children 2 years later. Face‐selective response in the bilateral fusiform gyrus was positively associated with rapid automatized naming (RAN). Response to both spoken and written words at preliterate age was negatively associated with RAN in the dorsal temporo‐parietal language system. Longitudinally, neural response to faces in the ventral stream predicted future reading fluency. Here, stronger neural activity in inferior and middle temporal gyri at kindergarten age was associated with higher reading performance. Our results suggest that interindividual differences in the neural system of language and reading affect literacy acquisition and thus might serve as a marker for successful reading acquisition in preliterate children.     

Does intellectual disability affect the development of dental caries in patients with cerebral palsy?

The aim of this study was to evaluate if the severity of intellectual disability is a factor that affects the development of dental cavities in patients with cerebral palsy. This cross-sectional study was conducted on 165 individuals who were selected from a physical rehabilitation center, a special public school and a regular public school. Of these, 76 individuals had been diagnosed with spastic cerebral palsy and 89 had no neurological impairment. The subjects were matched based on age and gender and selected randomly by lottery. All patients were examined to determine the number of dental cavities, and tested for their intellectual functioning (Raven Test) and motor abilities. The study showed that children with CP who presented with intellectual disabilities had a larger number of dental cavities than children with CP without intellectual disabilities. Considering intellectual functioning and motor impairment in the multivariate logistic regression, only intellectual functioning was found to have a significant effect on the development of dental cavities. These results suggest that intellectual disability can be considered a contributing factor for the development of dental caries in patients with cerebral palsy.     

Reading disabilities in Japan: evidence against the myth of rarity

The incidence of the reading disabilities among 250 Japanese children (8.5-13.4 years old) was measured by a standardized reading ability test which had recently been developed. It was found that 16.4% of the children tested have a one year delay, and 15.2% of the children have a two year delay. The results show that Makita's (1968) claim concerning the rarity of the incidence of reading disabilities in Japan is incorrect.     

Early phonological awareness and reading skills in children with Down syndrome

Increasingly, children with Down syndrome receive literacy instruction with the expectation of acquiring functional reading skills. Unfortunately, little is known about the processes underlying literacy skills in this special population. Phonological awareness contributes to literacy development in typically developing children, however, there is inconclusive evidence about these skills in younger children with Down syndrome. 9 children with Down syndrome (5.6-8.10 years) participated in this investigation. Due to the paucity of standardised phonological awareness measures for children with special needs, in particular children with Down syndrome, a variety of tasks were adapted from the literature. The assessment battery examined the skills of phonological awareness, literacy, speech production, expressive language, hearing acuity, speech perception, and auditory-visual memory. The results suggest that children with Down syndrome are at risks for reading acquisition difficulties due to reduced phonological awareness skills. These deficits are in addition to delays caused by reduced cognitive skills. Only one of the participants was able to demonstrate rhyme awareness, which may have been due to task effects. Written word recognition ability was correlated with tests of phonemic awareness, and error analysis of the spelling and non-word reading tasks suggested grapheme-phoneme connections deficits. Further research is needed to determine the best methods of assessment and intervention for phonological awareness in children with Down syndrome.