CDT Foundations of Dyslexia & Language-Based Learning Disabilities 3 — Questions and Answers
Question 1: In the context of language-based learning disabilities, which term refers to a significant discrepancy between oral language comprehension and reading comprehension with intact decoding?
- Hyperlexia
- Specific language impairment
- Language comprehension deficit (poor comprehender profile) (Correct answer)
- Developmental language disorder with dyslexia
Correct answer: Language comprehension deficit (poor comprehender profile)
Poor comprehenders decode accurately but fail to understand text because of underlying language comprehension deficits, representing a distinct profile from dyslexia.
Question 2: Which theoretical model proposes that skilled reading requires both a phonological pathway and a direct orthographic pathway to access word meaning?
- The Simple View of Reading
- The Dual-Route Cascaded (DRC) model (Correct answer)
- The Orton-Gillingham model
- The Connectionist Triangle model
Correct answer: The Dual-Route Cascaded (DRC) model
The Dual-Route Cascaded model posits a lexical (direct orthographic) route and a sublexical (phonological) route for reading, explaining different error patterns in dyslexia.
Question 3: A student consistently reads 'horse' as 'house' and 'farm' as 'form.' These errors most likely indicate a deficit in which area?
- Phoneme segmentation at the onset level
- Vowel pattern and medial phoneme discrimination (Correct answer)
- Sight word memory for high-frequency words
- Rapid automatized naming speed
Correct answer: Vowel pattern and medial phoneme discrimination
Confusing medial vowels and similar-sounding medial consonants indicates difficulty discriminating vowel patterns and medial phonemes within words.
Question 4: The 'phonological core deficit' model of dyslexia was most prominently developed and supported by which researcher?
- Maryanne Wolf
- Keith Stanovich
- Frank Vellutino (Correct answer)
- Sally Shaywitz
Correct answer: Frank Vellutino
Frank Vellutino's research in the 1970s–1990s was foundational in establishing that phonological (not visual) processing deficits are the core cause of dyslexia.
Question 5: Which characteristic of English orthography makes it particularly challenging for students with dyslexia compared to more transparent orthographies?
- English has fewer morphemes than other languages
- English has an opaque, deep orthography with inconsistent grapheme-phoneme correspondences (Correct answer)
- English words are longer on average than Spanish words
- English lacks vowel markers unlike Semitic languages
Correct answer: English has an opaque, deep orthography with inconsistent grapheme-phoneme correspondences
English has a deep orthography where the same phoneme can be spelled multiple ways and the same spelling can represent different phonemes, increasing the phonological decoding burden.
Question 6: Which condition is characterized by significant difficulty with written expression, including handwriting, spelling, and written composition, often co-occurring with dyslexia?
- Dyspraxia
- Dysgraphia (Correct answer)
- Dyscalculia
- Developmental coordination disorder
Correct answer: Dysgraphia
Dysgraphia specifically affects written expression and often co-occurs with dyslexia since both involve language-based processing, though dysgraphia also has a motor component.
Question 7: According to Ehri's phases of word reading development, which phase is characterized by using some letter-sound knowledge but not the full alphabetic code?
- Pre-alphabetic phase
- Partial alphabetic phase (Correct answer)
- Full alphabetic phase
- Consolidated alphabetic phase
Correct answer: Partial alphabetic phase
In the partial alphabetic phase, children use some letter-sound cues (often initial and final consonants) but rely on partial phonetic cues rather than complete decoding.
CDT Foundations of Dyslexia & Language-Based Learning Disabilities 3
In the context of language-based learning disabilities, which term refers to a significant discrepancy between oral language comprehension and reading comprehension with intact decoding?