Reading disorders can have a variety of causes

Reading disorders can have a variety of causes and cannot be treated in a standardised way. According to today’s knowledge of the complexity of the reading process and the different possibilities of functional disorders, it is no longer sufficient to simply diagnose dyslexia or reading difficulties. In order to initiate therapy aimed at the specific cause of the reading disorder, it is necessary to identify the cause. With the professional edition, it is possible to make a differentiated diagnosis for each pupil individually and to carry out a therapy that is customised to the respective pupil.

Accuracy before speed

The same applies to the professional edition: accuracy comes before speed. The student’s performance often depends on their form on the day. The basic rule is to ensure that the student is always challenged but never overtaxed in all exercises.

Practising at the performance limit

The general training principle applies: Practise at your performance limit!

The central element of this diagnostic and therapy software is to first determine the pupil’s individual performance level (e.g. can recognise 4 letters reliably in 250 ms and pronounce them immediately). This level of performance forms the starting point from which the pupil improves in small steps. The same exercises are therefore used for diagnosis (i.e. to determine the level of performance) and for treatment.

An example

To illustrate the principle, let’s take the high jump, for example:

Every child can jump over the bar up to a certain level. This limit is the child’s respective performance level, their “operating point” so to speak. Once this has been determined, the bar is raised in small steps to improve the child’s performance through practice. The “operating point” of the respective child is also determined individually in this software without standardised specifications and the exercises or therapy are adapted to the performance level.

Suitable for all people with dyslexia

The programme is suitable for anyone who has difficulties with reading and writing. The professional set contains everything that celeco has developed to date on the subject of dyslexia and reading difficulties. It is used by doctors, psychologists, therapists and other specialist carers for differential diagnosis and therapy. Ideally, parents should have the exercise set at home to enable daily practice. A coordinated form of therapy between parents and carers, the possibility of using the homework function and continuity when practising are very important for progress.

Can be used from the 1st grade

The professional set can be used from first grade (from knowing a few letters) to adulthood, as it – like the exercise set – contains an editor for creating your own exercises and for reading in or entering your own texts. For example, adult users can copy specialist journal articles from the Internet into the programme in order to work with them.

Numerous possible causes

Dyslexia – nowadays more accurately referred to as reading and spelling difficulties, or dyslexia for short – can be caused by numerous different performance deficits, as recent research has shown. These often include weaknesses in visual perception that are difficult to recognise, attention deficit disorder, inadequate eye movements, specific memory deficits and many other sensory and cognitive impairments.

Learn reading the right way

Our method of “learn reading the right way” consists of systematically learning the sub-skills required for reading, first individually and then in a coordinated sequence. The development of a reading disorder can be effectively prevented by recognising a disordered partial performance or a lack of coordination between partial performances as soon as possible and taking appropriate measures to avoid it.

Such measures may consist of

• A weak partial performance is improved by additional practice
• Compensated (offset) by another service
• Coordination errors are avoided by practising the correct coordination between services

The therapy proceeds in two directions:

1. Learning the correct reading strategy

First of all, the child learns a reading strategy with which it can quickly learn to circumvent its performance weakness and read correctly despite this performance weakness. If, for example, the cause of the reading disorder is that a child can only read word segments of 3 letters in length, he or she learns to divide the text into segments of 3 letters and to only glance over segments of 3 letters in length.

If a child needs 2 seconds to recall the sequence of sounds associated with a word segment seen and one cause of the reading disorder is that the child does not keep to this time but jumps to the next word segment too soon, the programme helps the child to learn to pronounce the word segment seen only after 2 seconds and only then to jump to the next word segment with the eyes..

2. Reduce performance weaknesses through systematic training

At the same time, the software helps to reduce performance weaknesses through systematic training.

Example:

If a child can only read word segments of 3 letters in length, he or she can practise using the programme to recognise segments of 4 letters in small steps and, once this level has been reached, longer segments.

Small learning units

Small learning units of around 15 minutes are very important for concentration, memory and weekly continuity. Children are not distracted by multimedia effects – there are deliberately no animations in the programme so that all attention is focused on reading and writing.

Software for teachers and therapists

The professional edition is often used in remedial lessons in mainstream and special needs schools and in combination with the exercice set. The homework system ensures a good connection between the professional and exercice sets.

Software for the professional

The professional set is used for the diagnosis and treatment of reading disorders in therapy facilities, counselling centres and child and youth psychology facilities. It is also used in medical institutions such as doctors’ surgeries, hospitals and psychiatric centres.

Hint:
Both software versions are included in the school licence.