Improving Rapid Automatic Naming
Rapid Automatic Naming (RAN) refers to how quickly one can process and name aloud a series of familiar things - numbers, letters, colors, and objects. In Proust and the Squid, Maryanne Wolf writes, “Extensive research in my laboratory and around the world shows that RAN tasks are ‘one of the best predictors of reading performance’ across all tested languages.” In our latest research we show how Targeted Cognitive Intervention is improving RAN/RAS, leading to gains in single word reading.
Written by Stephen M. Wilkins, Ed.M. based on data research conducted by Dr. Eric Falke
Despite receiving code-based reading interventions, many people with dyslexia have life-long struggles with reading fluency. Fluent single word reading is a key, if not the key, rate-limiting factor to fluent reading comprehension of whole texts for students with dyslexia. Work at Carroll School has indicated that fluency single-word reading is the key rate-limiting factor to fluent reading comprehension of full texts in dyslexic students, largely because our students have strong language comprehension skills. Targeted Cognitive intervention (TCI) was created to advance the state of the art in reading remediation by removing the obstacles to fluent single word reading.
Rapid Naming Tests are measures of fluent categorical naming that tap into the same brain areas and connections required for fluent word recognition. Rapid naming tests correlate strongly with single word reading, and we chose to use rapid naming tests as outcome measures. These assessments are less instructionally dependent on a particular curriculum than a sight-word lexicon. They reflect the effects of varied experience rather than direct instruction, and they can be measured across a wide range of student reading skills. These tests have remained unchanged for the period of time being studied while sight word tests change with culture and time (such as the TOWR-E). It was not known previously if rapid naming speed can be improved in students with dyslexia. This study shows that it can be improved and offers hope that reading fluency struggles can be diminished.
The findings from this investigation are that TCI created interventions that addressed cognitive requirements for fluent single word reading. Single word reading is a multi-component skill in which cognitive factors such as attentional inhibition contribute between 10-20% of the variance in single word fluency and rapid naming tests. This is comparable to the variance contributed by other factors such as phonological awareness, rapid automatic naming, and vocabulary.
When students participated in TCI’s cognitive activities designed to improve processing speed, they experienced gains in attention, processing speed, memory, and other skills. There was a standard score gain between 7-15 points on RAN/RAS assessments. This translates to an additional improvement in word reading of approximately 1-2 standard score points compared to students who did not receive the TCI instruction. While modest on an annual basis, such small increases in annual growth add up to larger and impactful gains over time. Dr. Eric Falke’s previous white paper on reaction time and reading fluency showed that improvements in attentional inhibition correlated with about a 10% annual increase in RAN/RAS scores. This compels us to look at the longitudinal impact of students doing cognitive activities that are focused on underlying cognitive weakness that are closely associated with reading fluency.
The longitudinal study examined long-term impact of TCI by comparing four years of growth in RAN/RAS scores in students who either did, or did not, receive TCI. These fifty children attended Carroll School either before or after TCI was introduced as a core curriculum to every student in 4th through 9th grade, and they all had a weakness in RAN/RAS performance. The TCI interventions all focused on reading fluency, with at least thirty 24 minute sessions. The control group received no TCI intervention.
The experimental group scores in all domains (objects, colors, letters, numbers, and two-set) significantly improved over the four years examined (p<0.05). The rate of growth in objects, colors, letters, and numbers was faster in the TCI group than in the control. These differences were statistically significant for numbers (p<0.03), and a strong trend for objects (p<0.055). Differences in letters and colors were not statistically significant, but consistent with the trends seen in numbers and objects (see Figure 1).
The conclusion of this study is that non-reading, cognitive factors are an important component of the reason why students with dyslexia struggle with fluent reading comprehension. This preliminary study of a relatively small number of non-randomized students strongly suggests that cognitive interventions, such as TCI, be given over time in order to yield a cumulative improvement in reading fluency. This is the first time that improvements in RAN/RAS have been definitively documented in dyslexia students. There is hope presented in this study, as slow visual identification (of squiggles on a page) was once thought to be an unchangeable trait.
This information needs to be in the minds and imagination of teachers who teach children to read. They need access to neuroscientific information. The path over the bridge between science and classroom pedagogy has to be built. “Perhaps the surest path to protecting reading policy and practice from radical pendulum swings, fads, and ideology is to create a sovereign profession. Ultimately, teachers must be involved in establishing and regulating professional norms. Sociologist Paul Starr asserts that the legitimacy of professional authority and competence rests on “three distinctive claims: first, that knowledge and competence of the professional have been validated by a community of his or her peers; second, that this consensually validated knowledge and competence rest on rational, scientific grounds; and third, that the professional’s judgment and advice are oriented toward a set of substantive values, such as health.” Few would dispute that the teaching profession is oriented toward a substantive and valuable goal—the education and cognitive development of young children. Today, it would also be noncontroversial to suggest that substantial progress in reading research has built a strong empirical foundation for improving reading instruction.” (James S. Kim, Research and Reading Wars, p110)
