PHONEMIC PROCESSING OF CHILDREN WITH LANGUAGE DEFICITS; WHICH TASKS BEST DISCRIMINATE CHILDREN WITH LEARNING DISABILITIES FROM AVERAGE READERS?

This comparative study investigated the levels of phonemic awareness that accounted for differences between children with learning disabilities (LD) and children of average reading ability of the same chronological age level (CA) and younger children of average reading ability at the same reading age level (RA). Two planned comparisons were implemented. All three groups were assessed on three levels of phonemic awareness represented as a hierarchical set: awareness of onset and rime, simple phonemic awareness, and compound phonemic awareness. Compared to the RA group, the LD group performed significantly worse only on the first level of phonemic awareness, the awareness of onset and rime. Results of a stepdown analysis revealed that compared with the CA matched group, the LD group performed significantly worse on compound phonemic awareness with all preceding variables partialled from the analysis. Implications for diagnosis and remediation of learning disabilities is explicated.