Checklist to Screen Children with Reading Difficulty (CSRD) for Classroom Teachers

Abstract

Literature estimates that at least 2.19 to 2.20 % of entire population suffer from dyslexia, the most prevalent type of Learning Disability. The high prevalence rate makes it necessary to develop tools for early identification of children with reading difficulties. Children who have problems or who are at risk for reading difficulty can be screened individually or in group. A majority of the tools developed cannot be carried out by teachers. Teachers generally use informal assessment or suspect a problem only when the child fails to perform grade appropriately. Due to lack of awareness of nature and characteristics of learning problems, they often tend to associate the failure in academic activities to reading difficulties. Hence a checklist to screen children with reading difficulty (CSRD) was developed in the present study and the teacher’s efficacy to screen children with reading difficulties was investigated.

A total of one hundred and thirteen children participated in the study. The study was carried out in three phases. A check list was developed in the first phase. The developed checklist was administered on typically developing children in the age range of 6 to 8 yrs. in phase II. The checklist was administered by the class teachers of the children. In the third phase, the efficacy of the checklist in identifying children at risk for reading difficulty was investigated. Early reading skills, a diagnostic test for identifying children with reading difficulty, was used to validate the results of the checklist. ROC curve was drawn; with a cut off score of 42.5, area under the curve was 0.913 with 90% of sensitivity and 81% of specificity. The results reveal that the checklist will be a useful tool for screening the children with reading difficulties.