Abstract:

In France, more than 15% of students entering middle school present reading difficulties. This raises acutely the question of how to help struggling readers. Researchers agree that an early intervention is the key to preventing learning difficulties from getting more severe with time. The objective of this research is to assess the effectiveness of a plan, combining reading level evaluation and remediation, to reduce reading difficulties in primary school students. Two experimental sessions were conducted over two school years. Written word identification performance of 913 students from grade 2 to grade 5 was evaluated at the beginning of school year. Then, students identified as having difficulties (408 students) received remediation sessions. Based on the double paths reading models, students identified with difficulties in written word identification received, depending on the difficulties identified, remedial sessions focusing either on the grapho-syllabic conversion abilities (the syllable is a prominent sublexical unit in French) or on the building and the strengthening of the orthographic lexicon. These remediation sessions were organized by teachers in small groups and took place between the months of November and May with a frequency of 2 to 3 times per week. At the end of the school year, written word identification performance of students was again evaluated. The increase in written word identification performance of students who have benefited from this device was compared to that of a control group. For the control group, written word identification performance of students from grade 2 to 5 had been evaluated at the beginning (391 students including 184 students identified as having reading difficulties) and the end of the school year, but none of them received the specific remediation sessions. The results indicate a larger increase in written word identification performance for students benefiting from the specific remediation than for students who did not. Thus, accessible solutions exist to address some forms of reading difficulties encountered by students in primary school. The results also highlight the importance of teacher training.

Keywords:

Reading, difficulty in written word identification, primary school, evaluation, remediation.