di: Fwd: DI and multi-sensory methods?

Tue Sep 25 23:00:51 PDT 2018

Dear Professor Hannon:

Thank you for your extensive note.I stand corrected.I knew it was probably a mistake to bring up my interest in neuroplasticityon this forum.

I definitely was not recommending either program referenced below, just reflecting on comments I have read and speculating on their connection to DI.But that is no excuse for sloppy thinking in a post.I am sure that there is a lot of fake science being broadcast under the name of neuroplasticity, as I am sure you will agree there is on behalf of education.

However, I still believe in the efficacy of DI.It certainly seems too have an impact on students' brains.

Thank you for correcting me.

Sincerely,

Bob Hullinghorst

Sent from XFINITY Connect App

------ Original Message ------

From: Kerry Hempenstall
To: ROBERT
Cc: DI at lists.uoregon.edu, DIANE M GRABOWSKI
Sent: September 25, 2018 at 6:13 PM
Subject: Re: di: Fwd: DI and multi-sensory methods?

Hi Robert,

I can understand your enthusiasm, but before recommending programs it is expected that there be evidence to support such recommendations.

"Two are Barbara Arrowsmith's program in Canada and a computer based program called Fast Forward.Both seem successful, and both sound very similar to the techniques and principles of DI."

Seeming successful is not enough. Arrowsmith, for example, has been around for more than 30 years, and there is not one refereed research article to support the program's effectiveness. There are anecdotes and in-house reports, but they do not constitute scientifically acceptable evidence.

“TheArrowsmith Research Initiatives Reportdated March 2014 declared that “Beginning in 1997, Barbara Arrowsmith Young in collaboration with research colleagues, engaged in conducting research looking at the outcomes of the Arrowsmith Program and some of the theoretical constructs of the program.” This report describesa range of investigations, including conference presentations, pilot studies, unpublished reports and research in progress. So it appears that, some 35 years since the introduction of the Arrowsmith Program, and 18 years after the declaration of intent to research its effectiveness, not one single study has appeared in a peer-reviewed journal.”

Tim Hannan
Associate Professor of Clinical Psychology

Head of School | School of Psychology

Charles Sturt University

Author (2014). Arrowsmith research initiatives report, March, 2014. Retrieved fromhttp://www.arrowsmithschool.org/arrowsmithprogram-background/pdf/Arrowsmith%20Program%20Research%20Initiatives%20-%20March%202014%20-%20FINAL.pdf.

See also attached piece by Castles and McArthur on Arrowsmith

And evidence for FastForWord:

“Fast ForWord is a suite of computer-based language intervention programs designed to improve children's reading and oral language skills. The programs are based on the hypothesis that oral language difficulties often arise from a rapid auditory temporal processing deficit that compromises the development of phonological representations. Methods: A systematic review was designed, undertaken and reported using items from the PRISMA statement. A literature search was conducted using the terms 'Fast ForWord' 'Fast For Word' 'Fastforword' with no restriction on dates of publication. Following screening of (a) titles and abstracts and (b) full papers, using pre-established inclusion and exclusion criteria, six papers were identified as meeting the criteria for inclusion (randomised controlled trial (RCT) or matched group comparison studies with baseline equivalence published in refereed journals). Data extraction and analyses were carried out on reading and language outcome measures comparing the Fast ForWord intervention groups to both active and untreated control groups. Results: Meta-analyses indicated that there was no significant effect of Fast ForWord on any outcome measure in comparison to active or untreated control groups. Conclusions: There is no evidence from the analysis carried out that Fast ForWord is effective as a treatment for children's oral language or reading difficulties.”

Strong, G., Torgerson, C., Torgerson, D.,&Hulme, C. (2011). A systematic meta-analytic review of evidence for the effectiveness of the 'Fast ForWord' language intervention program.The Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 52(3),224-235.

“Purpose: A randomized controlled trial was conducted to compare the language and auditory processing outcomes of children assigned to receive the Fast ForWord Language intervention (FFW-L) with the outcomes of children assigned to nonspecific or specific language intervention comparison treatments that did not contain modified speech.

Method: Two hundred sixteen children between the ages of 6 and 9 years with language impairments were randomly assigned to 1 of 4 conditions: (a) Fast ForWord Language (FFW-L), (b) academic enrichment (AE), (c) computer-assisted language intervention (CALI), or (d) individualized language intervention (ILI) provided by a speech-language pathologist. All children received 1 hr and 40 min of treatment, 5 days per week, for 6 weeks. Language and auditory processing measures were administered to the children by blinded examiners before treatment, immediately after treatment, 3 months after treatment, and 6 months after treatment.

Results: The children in all 4 conditions improved significantly on a global language test and a test of backward masking. Children with poor backward masking scores who were randomized to the FFW-L condition did not present greater improvement on the language measures than children with poor backward masking scores who were randomized to the other 3 conditions. Effect sizes, analyses of standard error of measurement, and normalization percentages supported the clinical significance of the improvements on the Comprehensive Assessment of Spoken Language (E. Carrow-Woolfolk, 1999). There was a treatment effect for the Blending Words subtest of the Comprehensive Test of Phonological Processing (R. K. Wagner, J. K. Torgesen,&C. A. Rashotte, 1999). Participants in the FFW-L and CALI conditions earned higher phonological awareness scores than children in the ILI and AE conditions at the 6-month follow-up testing.

Conclusion: Fast ForWord Language, the intervention that provided modified speech to address a hypothesized underlying auditory processing deficit, was not more effective at improving general language skills or temporal processing skills than a nonspecific comparison treatment (AE) or specific language intervention comparison treatments (CALI and ILI) that did not contain modified speech stimuli. These findings call into question the temporal processing hypothesis of language impairment and the hypothesized benefits of using acoustically modified speech to improve language skills. The finding that children in the 3 treatment conditions and the active comparison condition made clinically relevant gains on measures of language and temporal auditory processing informs our understanding of the variety of intervention activities that can facilitate development.” (p.97)

Gillam, R.B., Loeb, D.F., Hoffman, L.M., Bohman, T., Champlin, C.A., Thibodeau, L., Widen, J., Brandel, J.,&Friel-Patti, S. (2008). The efficacy of Fast ForWord language intervention in school-age children with language impairment: A randomized controlled trial.Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 51, 97-119.

“To examine the efficacy of Fast ForWord Language (FFW-L) and 2 other interventions for improving the phonemic awareness and reading skills of children with specific language impairment with concurrent poor reading skills. A total of 103 children (age 6;0 to 8; 11 [years;months]) with language impairment and poor reading skills participated. The children received either FFW-L computerized intervention, a computer-assisted language intervention (CALI), an individualized language intervention (ILI), or an attention control (AC) computer program. The children in the FFW-L, CALI, and ILI conditions made significantly greater gains in blending sounds in words compared with the AC group at immediate posttest. Long-term gains 6 months after treatment were not significant but yielded a medium effect size for blending sounds in words. None of the interventions led to significant changes in reading skills. The improvement in phonemic awareness, but not reading, in the FFW-L, CALI, and ILI interventions limits their use with children who have language impairment and poor reading skills. Similar results across treatment conditions suggest that acoustically modified speech was not a necessary component for improving phonemic awareness.”

Loeb, D., Gillam, R.B., Hoffman, L., Brandel, J.,&Marquis, J. (2009). The effects of Fast ForWord Language on the phonemic awareness and reading skills of school-age children with language impairments and poor reading skills.American Journal of Speech - Language Pathology,18(4), 376-87.

“The picture presented by the peer-reviewed research synthesized here is less optimistic than that presented by the FFW-Language vendors on the Scientific Learning Corporation website (2009). The published data does not support a strong claim that FFW-Language is more effective than other tools available to educators or that FFW Language is necessarily the best choice for all students reading below grade level.” (p.6)

Mocan, S. B.,&Leacock, T. L. (2009).Using Fast ForWord® to support learning to read: A review of the literature. In E-‐Learn 2009: Proceedings of the World Conference on E-Learning in Corporate, Government, Healthcare,&Higher Education, 1-8.

A useful summary of research into a range of interventions is attached.

Finally, neither program you mention is "similar to the techniques and principles of DI."They are based on very different principles - Arrowsmith on 19 hypothesised faulty brain regions, and FastForWord on an assumption concerning faulty auditory processing. DI emphasises the design and implementation of instruction in specific academic areas, such as reading, language, maths etc. It involved direct instruction, whereas FFW and Arrowsmith emphasise indirect instruction. That is, they attempt to address presumed faulty processes underlying academic skills. Thus far, this latter approach has not led to evidence of improved learning of the academic skills. That doesn't imply that indirect approaches can never be successful - simply that they have not been thus far, and their promotion wastes the time, energy, and money of families whose children are struggling academically. Additionally, there is the opportunity cost of time lost that could have been devoted to the type of effective instruction that DI offers.

On Wed, 26 Sep 2018 at 02:03, ROBERT<bhullinghorst at comcast.net(mailto:bhullinghorst at comcast.net)>wrote:
> Dear Diane:
>  
> For some reason, I can find nobody in neuroplasticity who references Zig's research behind Direct Instruction.However, there are several educational programs supposedly using techniques that are based on neuroplasticity research.Two are Barbara Arrowsmith's program in Canada and a computer based program called Fast Forward.Both seem successful, and both sound very similar to the techniques and principles of DI.Here is a general discussion, but you can easily find more information about each online.
>  
> (http://www.educationalleaders.govt.nz/content/download/81162/664344/file/Eden Chapman - neuroplasticity - sabbatical report 2017.pdf(http://www.educationalleaders.govt.nz/content/download/81162/664344/file/Eden%20Chapman%20-%20neuroplasticity%20-%20sabbatical%20report%202017.pdf)).
>  
> Sorry for the long link.
>  
> If I were not retired, I would make it a project to get the neuroplasticity folks together with the DI folks and see what happens.
>  
> Here is my take on what is happening in the brain of a child (probably anyone from birth up to the age when the brain becomes less plastic--say 25?).This is just speculation, based on my reading broadly, but there is some good science buried in it.
>  
> 1.The Hippocampus is producing lots of t-cells (a process called auto-genesis) that are becoming differentiated into specialized neurons in the cortex.(Auto-Genesis can extend into old age, but the rate seems slower and much of the cortex is already specialized.)
>  
> 2.If these t-cells, and especially their mitochondria, are properly nourished with a lot of specialized nutrients (especially Omega3 but many others too numerous to mention), then the neurons will specialize into structures in response to the environment based on the senses, including those in the muscles.Call this "education."
>  
> 3.It has been proven (especially in animal models, mice to chimps and some human brain studies) that "education" influences this specialization.Focused attention and repetition have been proven to be critical to influence specialization of neurons and even relative growth of parts of the brain.
>  
> 4.Excessive stress and anxiety (from poverty, domestic violence, bullying) and poor nutrition have been proven to interfere with the health of mitochondria, the auto-genesis of T-cells, and the specialization of neurons.(Of course, can an excessively competitive school environment contribute?)
>  
> 5.Brain malfunctions or diseases (like viral encephalitis and other illnesses) can also interfere with needed specialization, but there is evidence that many neuroplasticity treatments can reduce or reverse the impact of these issues.For example, there is exciting research on direct energy application to the tongue to treat some deficiencies. Again, see the two books by Norman Doige that I mentioned before--easily available from Amazon.It may well be that DI is a neuroplasticity treatment for brain malfunctions, but the two disciplines have not coalesced.
>  
> 6.Given the research on neuroplasticity and the research on DI, it seems undoubtable that DI techniques are superior in helping student brains to develop productive neural specialization at a time when their t-cells are developing normally in the cortex.
>  
> 7.In my opinion, if the educational institution was not such a cesspool of administrative inefficiency, we would have made much more progress.
>  
> At least that is the result of my rather limited reading and research, as well as my experience in public policy, and my biases.
>  
> I hope this helps.
>  
> Sincerely,
>  
> Bob Hullinghorst
> Boulder, CO
> .
> Sent from XFINITY Connect App
>  
>  
>  
> ------ Original Message ------
>  
> From: DIANE M GRABOWSKI
> To:di at lists.uoregon.edu(mailto:di at lists.uoregon.edu)list
> Sent: September 24, 2018 at 10:38 AM
> Subject: di: Fwd:DI and multi-sensory methods?
>  
> Dear Listmates,
>  
> Still wondering if there are anynewdevelopments since this last thread on multi-sensory methods? Is there currently any published evidence that the O-G programs are effective? There are a number of private schools here in PA that advertise O-G programs as an integral part of their curriculum for students with language and learning differences.
>  
> Thanks for your feedback!
>  
> Best,
> Diane in PA
>  
>  
> On Fri, Oct 30, 2015 at 12:24 PM, Carol Pio<cpio at kcsd96.org(mailto:cpio at kcsd96.org)>wrote:
> > According to a students' outside evaluation, programs such as Wilson or Orton-Gillingham are common reading programs that match this learner's specific needs. Per this evaluation, learning more about how mutli-sensory methods are applied in the offered Direct Instruction curriculum will be critical in determining the best fit for this student.
> >  
> > Can anyone help me to answer whether or not there is any research that proves DI programs to be more effective than Wilson or Orton-Gillingham?
> >  
> > Can any hands-on, multi-sensory approaches be added to our DI programs to enhance learning for this student?
> >  
> > Thanks,
> > Carol
> >  
> > --
> > Carol Pio
> > Individualized Learning Community, Grades 6-8
> > Twin Groves Middle School
> > _______________________________________________
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> >  
>  
>  
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--
Regards,

Kerry

Dr Kerry Hempenstall
Senior Industry Fellow,
School of Education,
RMIT University,
Melbourne Australia
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