Made by DATEXIS (Data Science and Text-based Information Systems) at Beuth University of Applied Sciences Berlin
Deep Learning Technology: Sebastian Arnold, Betty van Aken, Paul Grundmann, Felix A. Gers and Alexander Löser. Learning Contextualized Document Representations for Healthcare Answer Retrieval. The Web Conference 2020 (WWW'20)
Funded by The Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy; Grant: 01MD19013D, Smart-MD Project, Digital Technologies
Dyslexic children require special instruction for word analysis and spelling from an early age. While there are fonts that may help people with dyslexia better understand writing, this might simply be due to the added spacing between words. The prognosis, generally speaking, is positive for individuals who are identified in childhood and receive support from friends and family.
Through the use of compensation strategies, therapy and educational support, dyslexic individuals can learn to read and write. There are techniques and technical aids which help to manage or conceal symptoms of the disorder. Removing stress and anxiety alone can sometimes improve written comprehension. For dyslexia intervention with alphabet-writing systems, the fundamental aim is to increase a child's awareness of correspondences between graphemes (letters) and phonemes (sounds), and to relate these to reading and spelling by teaching how sounds blend into words. It has been found that reinforced collateral training focused on reading and spelling yields longer-lasting gains than oral phonological training alone. Early intervention that is done for children at a young age can be successful in reducing reading failure.
There is some evidence that the use of specially-tailored fonts may help with dyslexia. These fonts, which include Dyslexie, OpenDyslexic, and Lexia Readable, were created based on the idea that many of the letters of the Latin alphabet are visually similar and may, therefore, confuse people with dyslexia. Dyslexie and OpenDyslexic both put emphasis on making each letter more distinctive in order to be more easily identified. The benefits, however, might simply be due to the added spacing between words.
There have been many studies conducted regarding intervention in dyslexia. Among these studies one meta-analysis found that there was functional activation as a result.
There is no evidence demonstrating that the use of music education is effective in improving dyslexic adolescents' reading skills.
To date, very few interventions have been developed specifically for individuals with dyscalculia. Concrete manipulation activities have been used for decades to train basic number concepts for remediation purposes. This method facilitates the intrinsic relationship between a goal, the learner’s action, and the informational feedback on the action. A one-to-one tutoring paradigm designed by Lynn Fuchs and colleagues which teaches concepts in arithmetic, number concepts, counting, and number families using games, flash cards, and manipulables has proven successful in children with generalized math learning difficulties, but intervention has yet to be tested specifically on children with dyscalculia. These methods require specially trained teachers working directly with small groups or individual students. As such, instruction time in the classroom is necessarily limited. For this reason, several research groups have developed computer adaptive training programs designed to target deficits unique to dyscalculic individuals.
Software intended to remediate dyscalculia has been developed. While computer adaptive training programs are modeled after one-to-one type interventions, they provide several advantages. Most notably, individuals are able to practice more with a digital intervention than is typically possible with a class or teacher. As with one-to-one interventions, several digital interventions have also proven successful in children with generalized math learning difficulties. Räsänen and colleagues have found that games such as The Number Race and Graphogame-math can improve performance on number comparison tasks in children with generalized math learning difficulties.
Several digital interventions have been developed for dyscalculics specifically. Each attempts to target basic processes that are associated with maths difficulties. Rescue Calcularis was one early computerized intervention that sought to improve the integrity of and access to the mental number line. Other digital interventions for dyscalculia adapt games, flash cards, and manipulables to function through technology.
While each intervention claims to improve basic numerosity skills, the authors of these interventions do admit that repetition and practice effects may be a factor involved in reported performance gains. An additional criticism is that these digital interventions lack the option to manipulate numerical quantities. While the previous two games provide the correct answer, the individual using the intervention cannot actively determine, through manipulation, what the correct answer should be. Butterworth and colleagues argued that games like The Number Bonds, which allows an individual to compare different sized rods, should be the direction that digital interventions move towards. Such games use manipulation activities to provide intrinsic motivation towards content guided by dyscalculia research. One of these serious games is Meister Cody – Talasia, an online training that includes the CODY Assessment – a diagnostic test for detecting dyscalculia. Based on these findings, Rescue Calcluaris was extended by adaptation algorithms and game forms allowing manipulation by the learners. It was found to improve addition, subtraction and number line tasks, and was made available as Dybuster Calcularis.
A study used transcranial direct current stimulation (TDCS) to the parietal lobe during numerical learning and demonstrated selective improvement of numerical abilities that was still present six months later in typically developing individuals. Improvement were achieved by applying anodal current to the right parietal lobe and cathodal current to the left parietal lobe and contrasting it with the reverse setup. When the same research group used tDCS in a training study with two dyscalculic individuals, the reverse setup (left anodal, right cathodal) demonstrated improvement of numerical abilities.
Treatment is usually carried out by speech and language therapists/pathologists, who use a wide range of techniques to stimulate language learning. In the past, there was a vogue for drilling children in grammatical exercises, using imitation and elicitation, but such methods fell into disuse when it became apparent that there was little generalisation to everyday situations. Contemporary approaches to enhancing development of language structure, for younger children at least, are more likely to adopt 'milieu' methods, in which the intervention is interwoven into natural episodes of communication, and the therapist builds on the child's utterances, rather than dictating what will be talked about. Interventions for older children, may be more explicit, telling the children what areas are being targeted and giving explanations regarding the rules and structures they are learning, often with visual supports.
In addition, there has been a move away from a focus solely on grammar and phonology toward interventions that develop children's social use of language, often working in small groups that may include typically developing as well as language-impaired peers.
Another way in contemporary remediation differ from the past is that parents are more likely to be directly involved, but this approach is largely used with preschool children, rather than those whose problems persist into school age.,
For school-aged children, teachers are increasingly involved in intervention, either in collaboration with speech and language therapists/pathologists, or as the main agents of delivery of the intervention. Evidence for the benefits of a collaborative approach is emerging, but the benefits of asking education staff to be the main deliverers of SLT intervention (the “consultative” approach) are unclear. When SLT intervention is delivered indirectly by trained SLT assistants, however, there are indications that this can be effective.
A radically different approach has been developed by Tallal and colleagues, who devised a computer-based intervention, FastForWord, that involves prolonged and intensive training on specific components of language and auditory processing. The theory underlying FastForword maintains that language difficulties are caused by a failure to make fine-grained auditory discriminations in the temporal dimension, and the computerised training materials are designed to sharpen perceptual acuity. However, a systematic review of clinical trials assessing FastForWord reported no significant gains relative to a control group.
In this field, Randomized controlled trial methodology has not been widely used, and this makes it difficult to assess clinical efficacy with confidence. Children's language will tend to improve over time, and without controlled studies, it can be hard to know how much of observed change is down to a specific treatment. There is, however, increasing evidence that direct 1:1 intervention with an SLT/P can be effective for improving vocabulary and expressive language. There have been few studies of interventions that target receptive language, though some positive outcomes have been reported.,
Remediation includes both appropriate remedial instruction and classroom accommodations.
Treatment for dysgraphia varies and may include treatment for motor disorders to help control writing movements. The use of occupational therapy can be effective in the school setting, and teachers should be well informed about dysgraphia to aid in carry-over of the occupational therapist's interventions. Treatments may address impaired memory or other neurological problems. Some physicians recommend that individuals with dysgraphia use computers to avoid the problems of handwriting. Dysgraphia can sometimes be partially overcome with appropriate and conscious effort and training. The International Dyslexia Association suggests the use of kinesthetic memory through early training by having the child overlearn how to write letters and to later practice writing with their eyes closed or averted to reinforce the feel of the letters being written. They also suggest teaching the students cursive writing as it has fewer reversible letters and can help lessen spacing problems, at least within words, because cursive letters are generally attached within a word.
Diagnosing dysgraphia can be challenging but can be done at facilities specializing in learning disabilities. It is suggested that those who believe they may have dysgraphia seek a qualified clinician to be tested. Clinicians will have the client self-generate written sentences and paragraphs, and copy age-appropriate text. They will assess the output of writing, as well as observe the client's posture while writing, their grip on the writing instrument, and will ask the client to either tap their finger or turn their wrists repeatedly to assess fine motor skills.
Dyscalculia is difficulty in learning or comprehending arithmetic, such as difficulty in understanding numbers, learning how to manipulate numbers, and learning facts in mathematics. It is generally seen as a specific developmental disorder.
Dyscalculia can occur in people from across the whole IQ range – often higher than average – along with difficulties with time, measurement, and spatial reasoning. Estimates of the prevalence of dyscalculia range between 3 and 6% of the population. In 2004, it was reported that a quarter of children with dyscalculia had ADHD.
In 2015, it was established that 11% of children with dyscalculia also have ADHD. Dyscalculia has also been associated with people who have Turner syndrome and people who have spina bifida.
Mathematical disabilities can occur as the result of some types of brain injury, in which case the proper term, acalculia, is to distinguish it from dyscalculia which is of innate, genetic or developmental origin.
Surface dyslexia is a type of dyslexia, or reading disorder. According to Marshall & Newcombe's (1973) and McCarthy & Warrington's study (1990), patients with this kind of disorder cannot recognize a word as a whole due to the damage of the left parietal or temporal lobe. Individuals with surface dyslexia are unable to recognize a word as a whole word and retrieve its pronunciation from memory. Rather, individuals with surface dyslexia rely on pronunciation rules. Thus, patients with this particular type of reading disorder read non-words fluently, like "yatchet", but struggle with words that defy pronunciation rules (i.e. exception words). For example, a patient with surface dyslexia can correctly read regular words like "mint", but will err when presented a word that disobeys typical pronunciation rules, like "pint". Often, semantic knowledge is preserved in individuals with surface dyslexia.
A reading disability is a condition in which a sufferer displays difficulty reading resulting primarily from neurological factors. Developmental Dyslexia, Alexia (acquired dyslexia), and Hyperlexia (word-reading ability well above normal for age and IQ).
Some studies have demonstrated improvements in reading and spelling performance of individual children with surface dyslexia. Many of the interventions that exist are based on the dual route model of reading and utilize a targeted approach based on the individual assessment results.
Case studies conducted by Law and Cupples (2015) recommend first identifying specific oral reading difficulties experienced by the individual with surface dyslexia and based on the reading patterns identified designing a theoretically motivated and targeted treatment program. One of the interventions involved targeting visual-orthographic processing by increasing the efficiency by which surface dyslexics identified nonwords. The second intervention involved training in the identification and decoding of common letter patterns in irregular words.
Language-based learning disabilities or LBLD are "heterogeneous" neurological differences that can affect skills such as listening, reasoning, speaking, reading, writing, and maths calculations. It is also associated with movement, coordination, and direct attention. LBLD is not usually identified until the child reaches school age. Most people with this disability find it hard to communicate, to express ideas efficiently and what they say may be ambiguous and hard to understand
It is a neurological difference. It is often hereditary, and is frequently associated to specific language problems.
There are two types of learning disabilities: non-verbal, which includes disabilities from psychomotor difficulties to dyscalculia, and verbal, language based.
LBLD can be an enduring problem. Some people might experience overlapping learning disabilities that make improvement problematic. Others with single disabilities often show more improvement. Most subjects can achieve literacy via coping mechanisms and education.
The term developmental language disorder (DLD) was endorsed in a consensus study involving a panel of experts (CATALISE Consortium) in 2017... The study was conducted in response to concerns that a wide range of terminology was used in this area, with the consequence that there was poor communication, lack of public recognition, and in some cases children were denied access to services. Developmental language disorder is a subset of language disorder, which is itself a subset of the broader category of speech, language and communication needs (SLCN).
The terminology for children’s language disorders has been extremely wide-ranging and confusing, with many labels that have overlapping but not necessarily identical meanings. In part this confusion reflected uncertainty about the boundaries of DLD, and the existence of different subtypes. Historically, the terms ‘’developmental dysphasia’’ or ‘’developmental aphasia’’ were used to describe children with the clinical picture of DLD. These terms have, however, largely been abandoned, as they suggest parallels with adult acquired aphasia. This is misleading, as DLD is not caused by brain damage.
Although the term DLD has been used for many years, it has been less common than the term Specific language impairment (SLI), which has been widely adopted, especially in North America. The definition of SLI overlaps with DLD, but was rejected by the CATALISE panel because it was seen as overly restrictive in implying that the child had relatively pure problems with language in the absence of any other impairments. Children with such selective problems are relatively rare, and there is no evidence that they respond differently to intervention, or have different causal factors, from other children with language problems.
UK speech and language therapists widely use the term Speech, Language and Communication Needs (SLCN), but this is far broader than DLD, and includes children with speech and language difficulties arising from a wide range of causes.
The question of whether to refer to children's language problems as ‘disorder’ was a topic of debate among the CATALISE consortium, but the conclusion was that ‘disorder’ conveyed the serious nature and potential consequences of persistent language deficits. It is also parallel with other neurodevelopmental conditions and consistent with diagnostic frameworks such as DSM5 and ICD-11. Where there are milder or more transient difficulties, language difficulties may be a more appropriate term.
Specific language impairment (SLI) is diagnosed when a child has delayed or disordered language development for no apparent reason. Usually the first indication of SLI is that the child is later than usual in starting to speak and subsequently is delayed in putting words together to form sentences. Spoken language may be immature. In many children with SLI, understanding of language, or "receptive" language, is also impaired, though this may not be obvious unless the child is given a formal assessment.
Although difficulties with use and understanding of complex sentences are a common feature of SLI, the diagnostic criteria encompass a wide range of problems, and for some children other aspects of language are problematic (see below). In general, the term SLI is reserved for children whose language difficulties persist into school age, and so it would not be applied to toddlers who are late to start talking, most of whom catch up with their peer group after a late start.
Interventions include:
- Mastery model:
- Learners work at their own level of mastery.
- Practice
- Gain fundamental skills before moving onto the next level
- Note: this approach is most likely to be used with adult learners or outside the mainstream school system.
- Direct instruction:
- Emphasizes carefully planned lessons for small learning increments
- Scripted lesson plans
- Rapid-paced interaction between teacher and students
- Correcting mistakes immediately
- Achievement-based grouping
- Frequent progress assessments
- Classroom adjustments:
- Special seating assignments
- Alternative or modified assignments
- Modified testing procedures
- Quiet environment
- Special equipment:
- Word processors with spell checkers and dictionaries
- Text-to-speech and speech-to-text programs
- Talking calculators
- Books on tape
- Computer-based activities
- Classroom assistants:
- Note-takers
- Readers
- Proofreaders
- Scribes
- Special education:
- Prescribed hours in a resource room
- Placement in a resource room
- Enrollment in a special school for learning disabled students
- Individual education plan (IEP)
- Educational therapy
Sternberg has argued that early remediation can greatly reduce the number of children meeting diagnostic criteria for learning disabilities. He has also suggested that the focus on learning disabilities and the provision of accommodations in school fails to acknowledge that people have a range of strengths and weaknesses, and places undue emphasis on academic success by insisting that people should receive additional support in this arena but not in music or sports. Other research has pinpointed the use of resource rooms as an important—yet often politicized component of educating students with learning disabilities.
There have been many different studies done in an attempt to treat deep dyslexics, all which have been met with varying success. One method that has been frequently used is to teach patients to sound out words using grapheme-to-phoneme correspondence rules (for example, using single letter graphemes such as the letter 'B" to link with larger words such as "Baby", allowing for association of phonemes). Such methods are known as "non-lexically based reading treatments". Other studies have looked at attempting to repair the semantic-lexical route, known as "lexically based treatment". Regardless of the methodology, treatment studies with deep dyslexics are difficult because much of the information regarding this disability is still heavily debated. Treatment options may be successful on repairing one route of reading but not another, and success for one patient may not translate to success in another.
Deep dyslexia is a form of dyslexia that disrupts reading processes. Deep dyslexia may occur as a result of a head injury, stroke, disease, or operation. This injury results in the occurrence of semantic errors during reading and the impairment of nonword reading.
The term dyslexia comes from the Greek words 'dys' meaning 'impaired', and 'lexis' meaning 'word' and is used to describe disorders of language concerning reading and spelling.
Numerous models and hypotheses have been proposed in attempt to explain the broad range of symptoms experienced by deep dyslexics, but a definite consensus has yet to be reached. The proposed models and hypotheses have helped in treatment of some suffering patients, but only with certain specific symptoms. Additionally, the recovery seen is not experienced equally in all patients.
Epidemiological surveys, in the US and Canada, estimated the prevalence of SLI in 5-year-olds at around 7 percent. However, neither study adopted the stringent 'discrepancy' criteria of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders or ICD-10; SLI was diagnosed if the child scored below cut-off on standardized language tests, but had a nonverbal IQ of 90 or above and no other exclusionary criteria.
Learning disability is a classification that includes several areas of functioning in which a person has difficulty learning in a typical manner, usually caused by an unknown factor or factors. Given the "difficulty learning in a typical manner", this does not exclude the ability to learn in a different manner. Therefore, some people can be more accurately described as having a "Learning Difference", thus avoiding any misconception of being disabled with a lack of ability to learn and possible negative stereotyping.
In the UK, the term "learning disability" generally refers to an intellectual disability, while difficulties such as dyslexia and dyspraxia are usually referred to as "learning difficulties".
While "learning disability, learning disorder" and "learning difficulty" are often used interchangeably, they differ in many ways. Disorder refers to significant learning problems in an academic area. These problems, however, are not enough to warrant an official diagnosis. Learning disability, on the other hand, is an official clinical diagnosis, whereby the individual meets certain criteria, as determined by a professional (psychologist, pediatrician, etc.). The difference is in degree, frequency, and intensity of reported symptoms and problems, and thus the two should not be confused. When the term "learning disorder" is used, it describes a group of disorders characterized by inadequate development of specific academic, language, and speech skills. Types of learning disorders include reading (dyslexia), mathematics (dyscalculia) and writing (dysgraphia).
The unknown factor is the disorder that affects the brain's ability to receive and process information. This disorder can make it problematic for a person to learn as quickly or in the same way as someone who is not affected by a learning disability. People with a learning disability have trouble performing specific types of skills or completing tasks if left to figure things out by themselves or if taught in conventional ways.
Individuals with learning disabilities can face unique challenges that are often pervasive throughout the lifespan. Depending on the type and severity of the disability, interventions, and current technologies may be used to help the individual learn strategies that will foster future success. Some interventions can be quite simplistic, while others are intricate and complex. Current technologies may require student training to be effective classroom supports. Teachers, parents, and schools can create plans together that tailor intervention and accommodations to aid the individuals in successfully becoming independent learners. School psychologists and other qualified professionals quite often help design the intervention and coordinate the execution of the intervention with teachers and parents.
Dysgraphia is a biologically based disorder with genetic and brain bases. More specifically, it is a working memory problem. In dysgraphia, individuals fail to develop normal connections among different brain regions needed for writing. People with dysgraphia have difficulty in automatically remembering and mastering the sequence of motor movements required to write letters or numbers. Dysgraphia is also in part due to underlying problems in orthographic coding, the orthographic loop, and graphmotor output (the movements that result in writing) by one’s hands, fingers and executive functions involved in letter writing. The orthographic loop is when written words are stored in the mind’s eye, connected through sequential finger movement for motor output through the hand with feedback from the eye.
Phonological dyslexia is a reading disability that is a form of alexia (acquired dyslexia), resulting from brain injury, stroke, or progressive illness and that affects previously acquired reading abilities. The major distinguishing symptom of acquired phonological dyslexia is that a selective impairment of the ability to read pronounceable non-words occurs although the ability to read familiar words is not affected. It has also been found that the ability to read non-words can be improved if the non-words belong to a family of pseudohomophones.
There is no cure for the condition. Management is through therapy.
Developmental coordination disorder is a lifelong neurological condition that is more common in males than in females, with a ratio of approximately four males to every female. The exact proportion of people with the disorder is unknown since the disorder can be difficult to detect due to a lack of specific laboratory tests, thus making diagnosis of the condition one of elimination of all other possible causes/diseases. Approximately 5–6% of children are affected by this condition.
Semantic dyslexia is, as the name suggests, a subtype of the group of cognitive disorders known as alexia (acquired dyslexia). Those who suffer from semantic dyslexia are unable to properly attach words to their meanings in reading and/or speech. When confronted with the word "diamond", they may understand it as "sapphire", "shiny" or "diamonds"; when asking for a bus ticket, they may ask for some paper or simply "a thing".
Semantic dementia (SD) is a degenerative disease characterized by atrophy of anterior temporal regions (the primary auditory cortex; process auditory information) and progressive loss of semantic memory. SD patients often present with surface dyslexia, a relatively selective impairment in reading low-frequency words with exceptional or atypical spelling-to-sound correspondences.
Hyperlexia is a syndrome characterized by a child's precocious ability to read. It was initially identified by Norman E. Silberberg and Margaret C. Silberberg (1967), who defined it as the precocious ability to read words without prior training in learning to read, typically before the age of 5. They indicated that children with hyperlexia have a significantly higher word-decoding ability than their reading comprehension levels. Children with hyperlexia also present with an intense fascination for written material at a very early age.
Hyperlexic children are characterized by having average or above-average IQs, and word-reading ability well above what would be expected given their age. First named and scientifically described in 1967 (Silverberg and Silverberg), it can be viewed as a superability in which word recognition ability goes far above expected levels of skill. Some hyperlexics, however, have trouble understanding speech. Some experts believe that most, or perhaps all children with hyperlexia, lie on the autism spectrum. However, one expert, Darold Treffert, proposes that hyperlexia has subtypes, only some of which overlap with autism. Between 5 and 20 percent of autistic children have been estimated to be hyperlexic.
Hyperlexic children are often fascinated by letters or numbers. They are extremely good at decoding language and thus often become very early readers. Some hyperlexic children learn to spell long words (such as "elephant") before they are two years old and learn to read whole sentences before they turn three.
An fMRI study of a single child showed that hyperlexia may be the neurological opposite of dyslexia.