Learning Disability Quarterly

In this longitudinal, multiple case study, I describe and compare the early development, instructional history, repeated administrations of a test battery, and response to instructional intervention for seven boys (in third to fifth grade at time of intervention), who were brain imaged prior to intervention and found to differ from controls in brain chemical activation during a phonological task. The instructional intervention was phonologically driven reading instruction in a science/reading workshop. At follow-up, phonological skills (phonological manipulation, phonological memory, and phonological decoding) had improved compared to initial assessment, but the boys were better at silent reading comprehension than oral reading, and had rate impairments and considerable difficulties with writing skills (handwriting automaticity, spelling, and speed of composing). Based on recent research on the genetic phenotype (language markers) and on early intervention, a case is made that dyslexia should be diagnosed early in schooling, on the basis of markers for deficient language processes and response to early intervention, so that appropriate instruction can be instituted early and continued throughout schooling as long as necessary. Dyslexia is a developmental disorder that manifests in different ways at different developmental stages, initially as difficulty in learning letters and letter-sound correspondence, next in learning to read words accurately, and finally in impaired reading rate and written expression skills (handwriting automaticity, spelling, and compositional fluency).

To date, seven intervention studies have been completed evaluating the efficacy of the Strategic Content Learning (SCL) approach as a model for promoting self-regulated learning by postsecondary students with learning disabilities. Summaries of outcomes from those studies suggest that SCL participation can be associated with gains for students in task performance, metacognitive knowledge, motivational beliefs, and strategic processing across a range of academic tasks (i.e., reading, writing, math). Previous SCL research reports have focused on general outcomes across participants and across tasks, rather than describing the details of individual cases. This article redresses that omission by describing the process of SCL intervention and associated outcomes for three SCL participants working on a common task, namely, writing. By reporting three in-depth parallel case studies, this article clarifies how SCL instruction is implemented to promote strategic writing, illustrates how SCL instructional principles can be personalized in response to individuals' needs, and traces the relationship between SCL instructional activities and outcomes. The article closes with a discussion of implications for theory, research, and practice.

The purpose of this study was to explore middle school students' (N = 54) perceptions of problem difficulty, persistence, and knowledge and use of problem-solving strategies in solving mathematical word problems. Students identified as learning disabled, average achieving, or gifted were tested individually as they solved six word problems classified as 1-, 2-, or 3-step problems. After the examiner read each problem, the student rated the problem's difficulty on a 1-to-6 scale (very easy to very hard) and then solved the problem. Results indicated that students with learning disabilities rated problems as significantly more difficult and had a significantly lower total word problem score than both average and gifted students. In comparison, average students rated problems as significantly more difficult than gifted students but did not differ significantly on total word problem score. There was no significant difference between students with learning disabilities and average achievers in the length of time they spent solving problems, but both groups took significantly longer than the gifted students. Students with learning disabilities used significantly fewer problem-solving strategies on the two- and three-step problems than both the average and the gifted students, who did not differ. Findings suggest that although students with learning disabilities perceive problems as more difficult than do their more successful peers, they do not spend more time solving problems. Even with greater persistence, however, they would still be at a serious disadvantage compared with better problem solvers because they seem to lack important problem-solving strategies for effective and efficient mathematical problem solving.

Collaborative teaching is being used more and more in serving academically able students with disabilities, including a large number of students with learning disabilities. The focus of this article is a series of recommendations to improve collaborative teaching. The recommendations were generated as a result of an intensive study of collaborative teaching in elementary, middle, and high school programs through interviews with administrators, teachers, parents, and students. The recommendations are divided into (a) general recommendations addressing service delivery, administrative, and communication issues and (b) training recommendations for new and indirectly involved personnel, parents, and university pre- and inservice programs.