Intervention Effectiveness for Students with Dyslexia and Reading Difficulties: A Case Study of Third Grade Vocabulary and Reading Comprehension

This study examined the effectiveness of reading intervention on students with dyslexia and with severe reading difficulties in phonemic awareness, reading fluency, vocabulary and/or reading comprehension in Gyeonggi province in Republic of Korea. This research was conducted as a part of the third year intervention support project with a total number of 69 student participants inclusive of 9 continuing participants from the previous years. The study participants’ grade range was from 1st to 6th in northern Gyeonggi province. From the screening test results and the referrals by teachers and childcare centers, final participants were selected and adequate reading intervention area(s) in need were identified and intervention was provided. Approximately 10 weeks with a total of 13-16 reading intervention sessions of intensive, differentiated instructions with Tier 2 or Tier 3 of Response to Intervention (RTI) service delivery were provided to the participants by certified instructors. For the analysis of the intervention effectiveness, paired t-test for each reading domain was conducted along with program satisfaction analysis. Third grade cases of school-referred and childcare center-referred participants were additionally analyzed on their progress slope of improvement for vocabulary and reading comprehension domains. Educational implications and additional considerations for future research were discussed.