How do new technologies influence reading and writing in our subject area classrooms?

Any of you who have read Chapter 7 of Maryanne Wolf's, Proust and the Squid, may wonder why I used this question from our literacy framework for a chapter titled, "Dyslexia's Puzzle and the Brain's Design". Let me explain:

After 120 years of research on dyslexia, new technology called magnetoencephalography, (How'd you like decoding that?) has provided a view of the reading regions of the brain. What researchers have found so far, is that children with dyslexia use a different reading circuitry. Wolf summarizes by saying she has a hunch that this new form of research will show that the brain has learned to compensate for its struggles by rearranging itself.

To illustrate the forward strides this new imaging has created, let's look at a major breakthrough that came in the 1870's. A French businessman and amateur musician, aka Monsieur X, woke up one morning unable to read words, musical notes, or name colors. Amazingly enough, he could still see perfectly. When he died several years later, his researcher found that he had suffered a stroke, causing damage to areas that could now be identified as necessary parts of the reading brain. It was through an autopsy that this was discovered. Notice the difference in accessibility to the brain between an autopsy and magnetic imaging. We've come a long ways . . .

Wolf covers 4 different principles involved in dyslexia: 1) a flaw in the older structures of the brain; 2) failure of the brain to achieve automaticity; 3) an impediment in the circuit connections among the brain structures; 4) a different circuit for reading (which correlates with the research provided by our latest technology). By turning away from the causes of dyslexia to the types, Wolf provides a helpful study for every one of us who work with struggling readers in our classrooms.

Approximately 25% of the children Wolf studied had only phonological deficits. 20% had only fluency deficits. The most common group had both. 10% couldn't be classified in either of the above ways; but another study showed severely impaired children not only had the combined deficits, but also struggled with short-term memory.

As we intervene with these children, our work should include orthography (features of letters, common letter patterns, and "sight" words), phonology (hearing, segmenting, and understanding small units of sounds), vocabulary, and morphology (the conventions surrounding how words are formed from smaller, meaningful roots, and units of meaning), all the while connecting and integrating these to form comprehension and fluency.

Most importantly, we must remember that dyslexia is not spelled, "dumb", "stubborn", or "not working to potential". I recommend reading, Thank You, Mr. Falker, by Patricia Polacco. This book is one of those that made a lasting influence in my life in regards to working with children who have reading challenges. The main character is a little girl who understood the sweetness of reading and wanted it more than anything in the world! What she got instead was labeling and teasing. . . until one day a teacher who cared entered her life. I don't know which part of the "happily ever after" I like the most: the girl's first sweet taste of reading, or the gratitude she forever feels for her teacher, or the books that she, Patricia Polacco, has written because she now can read. She is my inspiration.

Thanks to the latest technology, maybe someday we can diagnose and intervene before a child carries emotional scars from the battle with dyslexia.