A Civilized Disagreement on the Efficacy of the Davis Dyslexia Method

Last fall, Gimpy, a blogger in the U.K., wrote a scathing diatribe against learning disability profiteers, and a second post blasting the Davis Dyslexia Method.  A woman Abigail Marshall, who is the Davis Dyslexia Association's webmistress in the U.S., responded to Gimpy's second post. 

A civil conversation ensued in A response to Abigail Marshall and the Davis Dyslexia Association International.

I have two distinct objections to the Davis Method:

1. Ronald Davis came up with the method in  1980, before the publication of objective research (using brain-imaging technology) on the neurocognitive roots of dyslexia were widely known.  (mid-1990s).  He did not alter or change his Method based on new research, and the implications of the new research have been misrepresented by the Davis Dyslexia Association  (also see here, Brain Research and Dyslexia)
2. While the Davis Method has been offering "treatment" since 1982, no independent, objective evaluations of efficacy of the Davis Method have ever been performed, or  has the efficacy of the Davis Method ever been evaluated compared to other approaches to remediating dyslexia, such as the variations of the Orton-Gillingham approach or Rave-O

To summarize: The Davis Method has no basis in what we now know about the neurocognitive nature of reading, and has no evidence of efficacy.   Any educator or educational therapist recommending the Davis Method for remediation of dyslexia is behaving unethically.

As John Wills Lloyd wrote:

However, it seems to me that failing to make clear statements about the tenability of erroneous ideas is, in itself, a failure to serve as a provider of useful information. In the the absence of clear evidence that Treatment X is beneficial and presence of substantial evidence that Treatment X is actually harmful, I consider it important to advocate that parents, educators, and clinicians not use Treatment X. Indeed, as an advocate for kids and their families, isn’t it my duty to call “Bologna” when I’m confronted with unsubstantiated and disconfirmed hypotheses?

I don't think the Davis Method is "actively harmful" -- except to the parents' wallet, and the child's time and expectations.  But there is another sense in which it is damaging -- the totally unfounded "explanation" of dyslexia gets in the way of a more sophisticated and nuanced view of each dyslexic child's strengths and weaknesses.

Update: I, like Gimpy, believe that the people associated with the Davis Dyslexia Correction Method are motivated by  " a genuine desire to help dyslexic people" and that they believe in the validity and efficacy of what they are doing.

But "belief" isn't enough.  Data is necessary.

What would get me to change my mind about the Davis Method?  A randomized, controlled study, with a sufficiently large number of participants,  with pre- and post-treatment reading measures,  comparing (a) a known program training  phonological processing and decoding skills such as the one used in this study (b)  the Davis Method  and (c) no interventions, that showed that the Davis Method was superior in improving reading, as measured by the pre- and post-treatment measures.

What We Know About Dyslexia

Specific learning disability -- reading is has at least the following roots (we may discover more): 

• Difficulty processing speech sound (phonological weakness)
• Difficulty manipulating speech sounds (phonemic awareness)
• Difficulty with associating symbols (letters) with sounds
• Difficulty retrieving sounds and symbols from memory.

These difficulties are brain-based--functional magnetic imaging studies of dyslexic students' brains show that unremediated dyslexics use different parts of the brain for reading tasks.  Effective remediation "rewires" the brain (even in adults).

The proceeding is what most mainstream researchers now believe to be true about dyslexia.

Ronald Davis has a different (and unproven) approach.  He believes that dyslexics are prone to disorientation, and that they must be taught to control the mental state that leads to disorientation ( Davis Orientation Counseling®).  Mr. Davis also believes that all dyslexics "think in pictures" and are "triggered" into disorientation by reading words that cannot be pictured (such as "the" "at"  or "and).  The remedy is to model the words in clay (Davis Symbol Mastery®).

Unfortunately, Davis's assertions are not backed with the same scientific weight as the mainstream views, as no studies have been done to back his assertions, and no rigorous, independent evaluation of the efficacy of his approach have been undertaken, either.

Effective Teaching to Remediate Dyslexia--These steps must be mastered in order!

Phonemic Awareness  is the first step. You must teach someone how to listen to a  single word or syllable and break it into individual phonemes--the individual sounds.  The person may also have to have awareness raised--that /pin/ SHOULD sound a little different than /pen/.   The learner also has to be able to take individual sounds and blend them into a word,  change sounds, delete sounds, and compare sounds --all in their head. (Non dyslexic children learn these before the reading task begins.  These skills are easiest to learn before  someone brings in printed letters.)

Phoneme/Grapheme Correspondence is the next step. Here you teach which sounds are  represented by which letter(s), and how to blend those letters  into single-syllable words.

The Six Types of Syllables that compose  English words are taught next. If students know what type of  syllable they're looking at, they'll know what sound the vowel  will make. Conversely, when they hear a vowel sound, they'll  know how the syllable must be spelled to make that sound.

Probabilities and Rules are then taught. The English language provides several  ways to spell the same sounds. For example, the sound /SHUN/  can be spelled either TION, SION, or CION. The sound of /J/ at  the end of a word can be spelled GE or DGE. Dyslexic students  need to be taught these rules and probabilities.

Roots and Affixes as well as Morphology are then taught to expand a student's vocabulary  and ability to comprehend (and spell) unfamiliar words. For instance,  once a student has been taught that the Latin root TRACT means  pull, and a student knows the various Latin affixes, the student  can figure out that retract means pull again, contract means  pull together, subtract means pull away (or pull under), while  tractor means a machine that pulls.

How it is taught

Simultaneous Multisensory Instruction:  Sometimes we rattle this off and don't really explain what it means or why it is important

This can be confusing to parents
Sight or seeing, using the eyes = VISUAL
Hearing or listening, using the ears = AUDITORY
Feeling or touching, using the skin = TACTILE
Moving through space and time, using the whole body = KINESTHETIC

Reading and writing go together; writing is a kinestethic task--(can you feel how all the muscles in your hand and arm work to form letters as you write a sentence?).

Research has shown that dyslexic people who use  all of their senses when they learn (visual, auditory, tactile,  and kinesthetic) are better able to store and retrieve the information.  So a beginning dyslexic student might see the letter A, say its  name and sound, and write it in the air -- all at the same time. 

Intense Instruction with Ample Practice: The dyslexic brain benefits from overlearning--having a very precise focus with lots and lots of correct practice.

Direct, Explicit Instruction: dyslexic students do not automatically "get" anything about the reading task, and may not generalize well.  Therefore,   each detail of every rule that governs written language needs to be taught directly, one rule at a time.  Then the rule needs to be practices until the student has demonstrated that she has mastered the rule in both receptive (reading) and productive (writing and spelling) aspects.  Only then should the instructor introduce the next rule.

Systematic and Cumulative Many dyslexic students are not identified until later in their academic careers.  They have developed  mental "structures" of how English works that are completely wrong.  To develop good written language skills--reading and writing--the tutor must go back to  the very beginning and rebuild the student's mastery with a solid  foundation that has  no holes or cracks.  The student must learn the the logic behind our language,  by encountering  one rule at a time and practicing it until the use of the rule is   automatic and fluent when both reading  and writing (spelling).   The student must learn to connect  previously learned rules into current challenges.

Synthetic and Analytic: dyslexic students must be taught both how to take  the individual letters or sounds and put them together to form  a word (synthetic), as well as how to look at a long word and  break it into smaller pieces (analytic). Both synthetic and analytic  phonics must be taught all the time.

Diagnostic Teaching  the teacher must continuously assess their student's understanding  of, and ability to apply, the rules. The teacher must ensure  the student isn't simply recognizing a pattern and blindly applying  it. And when confusion of a previously-taught rule is discovered,  it must be retaught.

NOW WHAT? 
There are a number of places to get help.  The International Dyslexia Association can help, as can LD Online and Schwab Learning Susie Barton has a very helpful site.

Schwab Learning Articles
Effective Teaching Methods for Dyslexic Students
Elements of Good Research
Features of Good Reading Programs and Remediation
Myth of a Quick Fix

Comments

[Dave]

This reminded me of this paper

http://www.pnas.org/cgi/content/full/100/5/2860

Showing changes in neural activation when symptoms of dyslexia are resolved.

Some of their more recent work is

http://www.pnas.org/cgi/content/full/104/10/4234

[Liz Ditz]

First, abstracts on the two papers Dave mentions, above

====================

Published online on February 25, 2003, 10.1073/pnas.0030098100

PNAS | March 4, 2003 | vol. 100 | no. 5 | 2860-2865

Neural deficits in children with dyslexia ameliorated by behavioral remediation: Evidence from functional MRI

Elise Temple, Gayle K. Deutsch, Russell A. Poldrack, Steven L. Miller, Paula Tallal, Michael M. Merzenich, and John D. E. Gabrieli

Abstrract:

Developmental dyslexia, characterized by unexplained difficulty in reading, is associated with behavioral deficits in phonological processing. Functional neuroimaging studies have shown a deficit in the neural mechanisms underlying phonological processing in children and adults with dyslexia. The present study examined whether behavioral remediation ameliorates these dysfunctional neural mechanisms in children with dyslexia. Functional MRI was performed on 20 children with dyslexia (8-12 years old) during phonological processing before and after a remediation program focused on auditory processing and oral language training. Behaviorally, training improved oral language and reading performance. Physiologically, children with dyslexia showed increased activity in multiple brain areas. Increases occurred in left temporo-parietal cortex and left inferior frontal gyrus, bringing brain activation in these regions closer to that seen in normal-reading children. Increased activity was observed also in right-hemisphere frontal and temporal regions and in the anterior cingulate gyrus. Children with dyslexia showed a correlation between the magnitude of increased activation in left temporo-parietal cortex and improvement in oral language ability. These results suggest that a partial remediation of language-processing deficits, resulting in improved reading, ameliorates disrupted function in brain regions associated with phonological processing and produces additional compensatory activation in other brain regions.

========================

Published online on February 23, 2007, 10.1073/pnas.0609399104
PNAS | March 6, 2007 | vol. 104 | no. 10 | 4234-4239

Functional and morphometric brain dissociation between dyslexia and reading ability

Fumiko Hoeft,, Ann Meyler, Arvel Hernandez, Connie Juel, Heather Taylor-Hill, Jennifer L. Martindale, Glenn McMillon, Galena Kolchugina, Jessica M. Black, Afrooz Faizi, Gayle K. Deutsch, Wai Ting Siok, Allan L. Reiss, Susan Whitfield-Gabrieli, and John D. E. Gabrieli

Abstract

In functional neuroimaging studies, individuals with dyslexia frequently exhibit both hypoactivation, often in the left parietotemporal cortex, and hyperactivation, often in the left inferior frontal cortex, but there has been no evidence to suggest how to interpret the differential relations of hypoactivation and hyperactivation to dyslexia. To address this question, we measured brain activation by functional MRI during visual word rhyme judgment compared with visual cross-hair fixation rest, and we measured gray matter morphology by voxel-based morphometry in dyslexic adolescents in comparison with (i) an age-matched group, and (ii) a reading-matched group younger than the dyslexic group but equal to the dyslexic group in reading performance. Relative to the age-matched group (n = 19; mean 14.4 years), the dyslexic group (n = 19; mean 14.4 years) exhibited hypoactivation in left parietal and bilateral fusiform cortices and hyperactivation in left inferior and middle frontal gyri, caudate, and thalamus. Relative to the reading-matched group (n = 12; mean 9.8 years), the dyslexic group (n = 12; mean 14.5 years) also exhibited hypoactivation in left parietal and fusiform regions but equal activation in all four areas that had exhibited hyperactivation relative to age-matched controls as well. In regions that exhibited atypical activation in the dyslexic group, only the left parietal region exhibited reduced gray matter volume relative to both control groups. Thus, areas of hyperactivation in dyslexia reflected processes related to the level of current reading ability independent of dyslexia. In contrast, areas of hypoactivation in dyslexia reflected functional atypicalities related to dyslexia itself, independent of current reading ability, and related to atypical brain morphology in dyslexia.

[Liz Ditz]

Second, some provocative new papers

======= http://arjournals.annualreviews.org/doi/abs/10.1146/annurev.psych.59.103006.093633

Annu Rev Psychol. 2008 Jan 10;59:451-475. doi:10.1146/annurev.psych.59.103006.093633

The Education of Dyslexic Children from Childhood to Young Adulthood. Shaywitz SE, Morris R, Shaywitz BA.

The past two decades have witnessed an explosion in our understanding of dyslexia (or specific reading disability), the most common and most carefully studied of the learning disabilities. We first review the core concepts of dyslexia: its definition, prevalence, and developmental course. Next we examine the cognitive model of dyslexia, especially the phonological theory, and review empiric data suggesting genetic and neurobiological influences on the development of dyslexia. With the scientific underpinnings of dyslexia serving as a foundation, we turn our attention to evidence-based approaches to diagnosis and treatment, including interventions and accommodations. Teaching reading represents a major focus. We first review those reading interventions effective in early grades, and then review interventions for older students. To date the preponderance of intervention studies have focused on word-level reading; newer studies are beginning to examine reading interventions that have gone beyond word reading to affect reading fluency and reading comprehension. The article concludes with a discussion of the critical role of accommodations for dyslexic students and the recent neurobiological evidence supporting the need for such accommodations.

PMID: 18154503 [PubMed - as supplied by publisher]

=================================

http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/content~content=a787076466~db=all~jumptype=rss

Q J Exp Psychol (Colchester). 2008 Jan;61(1):142-56. DOI: 10.1080/17470210701508830

Specific disorders and broader phenotypes: the case of dyslexia.

Snowling MJ.

Department of Psychology, University of York, York, UK. [email protected]

Two studies investigating the cognitive phenotype of dyslexia are described. Study 1 compared three groups of English and Italian children on speed of processing tasks: (a) children with dyslexia, (b) generally delayed poor readers and (c) CA-controls. In tests of simple and choice reaction time and two visual scanning tasks, children with dyslexia performed like controls and significantly faster than generally delayed poor readers. A second prospective longitudinal investigation of children at family risk of dyslexia showed that problems of literacy development were less circumscribed, with affected children showing phonological deficits in the context of more general oral language difficulties. An important finding was that the risk of dyslexia was continuous in this sample; among at-risk children with normal literacy development, mild impairments of phonological skills were apparent early in development, and subtle difficulties with reading fluency and spelling emerged in early adolescence. A case series extended these findings to show that phonological deficits alone are insufficient to explain literacy difficulties, and it is children with multiple deficits (including language problems) that are more likely to succumb to reading failure.

PMID: 18038345 [PubMed - in process]

===========================

http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/content~content=a787077912~db=all~jumptype=rss

Q J Exp Psychol (Colchester). 2008 Jan;61(1):129-41. DOI: 10.1080/17470210701508822

What phonological deficit? Ramus F, Szenkovits G.

Laboratoire de Sciences Cognitives et Psycholinguistique (EHESS/CNRS/DEC-ENS), Paris, France. [email protected]

We review a series of experiments aimed at understanding the nature of the phonological deficit in developmental dyslexia. These experiments investigate input and output phonological representations, phonological grammar, foreign speech perception and production, and unconscious speech processing and lexical access. Our results converge on the observation that the phonological representations of people with dyslexia may be intact, and that the phonological deficit surfaces only as a function of certain task requirements, notably short-term memory, conscious awareness, and time constraints. In an attempt to reformulate those task requirements more economically, we propose that individuals with dyslexia have a deficit in access to phonological representations. We discuss the explanatory power of this concept and we speculate that a similar notion might also adequately describe the nature of other associated cognitive deficits when present.

PMID: 18038344 [PubMed - in process]

========= http://ldx.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/40/1/37

Intensive Instruction Affects Brain Magnetic Activity Associated with Oral Word Reading in Children with Persistent Reading Disabilities,

Simos, P.G. et al.Journal of Learning Disabilities, Vol. 40, No. 1, 37-48 (2007)

DOI: 10.1177/00222194070400010301

Fifteen children ages 7 to 9 years who had persistent reading difficulties despite adequate instruction were provided with intensive tutorial interventions. The interventions targeted deficient phonological processing and decoding skills for 8 weeks (2 hours per day) followed by an 8-week, 1-hour-per-day intervention that focused on the development of reading fluency skills. Spatiotemporal brain activation profiles were obtained at baseline and after each 8-week intervention program using magnetoencephalography during the performance of an oral sight-word reading task. Changes in brain activity were found in the posterior part of the middle temporal gyrus (Brodmann's Area [BA] 21: increased degree of activity and reduced onset latency), the lateral occipitotemporal region (BA 19/37: decreased onset latency of activation), and the premotor cortex (increased onset latency). Overall changes associated with the intervention were primarily normalizing, as indicated by (a) increased activity in a region that is typically involved in lexical—semantic processing (BA 21) and (b) a shift in the relative timing of regional activity in temporal and frontal cortices to a pattern typically seen in unimpaired readers. These findings extend previous results in demonstrating significant changes in the spatiotemporal profile of activation associated with word reading in response to reading remediation.

=============

[Ofer]

For many reasons regular spellchecker don't work effectively with people how suffers from dyslexia (10-17% of the population).

In order to help dyslexics we established a company named Ghotit www.Ghotit.com that develops different internet services that helps dyslexics perform better in their day to day activities.

Ghotit first solution is an online context sensitive spell checker that is capable to coupe with severe spelling mistakes and misused word for example Ghotit will offer a user that spells "I will be happy to meat you at 8 o'clock" to change the word meat to meet.

How to use Ghotit spellchecker:

1) Make sure you are in edit mode. If not, press the Edit Text option.
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5) Perform corrections by right-clicking on the marked word.
6) Review and select the correct words. To help you select the correct word Ghotit provides you a sub-menu with the definition of each candidate words. The selection of the correct word is performed in the sub-menu by selecting the option "Select candiate_word".
7) Once your have corrected/ignored all marked words, run the spellchecker again to perform to get additional Ghotit recommendations.
8) Repeat the process till Ghotit states that it is done and has no more recommendations to provide.
9) Press Edit Text to enter Edit mode so that you can copy the corrected text.

[John Hayes]

Re:This reminded me of this paper

http://www.pnas.org/cgi/content/full/100/5/2860

I would really like to see a breakdown of the individual scores rather than group scores pre and post intervention in the study.

Generally only the lowest scores in range semed to increase with the higher scores showing a decline of a couple of points in 4 out of 6 measures.

When you add the graphical data ( change of score V's size of effect ) I could almost suggest that the line fit would be better and more informative with a 2 line fit.

One line would be steeper than the one shown showing more effect with increased score.

The other line would be quite a bit flatter indicating less effect and less change in scores.

With the average of the range being so close in value to the average of the individual scores as reported in both pre and post remediation scores, the almost unchanging upper scores ( which would be represented by the flatter line ) in my mind really tends to skew the results.

I guess part of my problem is that I am assuming that there is a fairly even distribution of individual scores in the range because of the average of the individual scores is so close to the average of the range. It could be that the individual scores are only at the top and bottom of the range and still average the same but that seems unlikely.

All the above sets the stage for my question which is : If they can really see the differences in the brain why can't they have predicted which dyslexic would be helped by the intervention when it seems likely that the lower scoreing dyslexics had the largest increases with the highest scoreing dyslexics seeing little score improvement.

If you had dyslexics whose range of scores were 60-95 and gave them lots of intervention which dyslexics would you predict to see the largest increases? I would predict the ones at the lower end of the range.

[Ghotit]

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[ginger]

A better spell checker for people with Dyslexia

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[Jess Satnick]

Great information!

Thanks

Jess

[richie]

Nice, balanced treatment of dyslexia. The examples of teaching phonemic awareness were very helpful. I found some interesting phonemic awareness assessments (free) at http://www.penningtonpublishing.com