Egil Hunstad Tactile and Visual Training in Reading: Testing of Speed by Tachistoscope / "touch"- Tachistoscope Using High-frequency Words

This publication proceeds from experiments dealing with identification speed and reading speed among readers of braille (N = 17), reader/-users of CCTV (N = 7) and dyslectics (N = 11), compared with a group of especially quick and accomplished readers being used as a control. The experiments have been conducted over a time-span of several years, in step with the progressively new demands for empirical findings that arose out of the author's clinical experience in dealing with the visually and dyslectically handicapped and their reading difficulties. A primary question underlying this study has been whether it might be possible to improve the reading performance both of those who have suffered loss of vision and of those who had special reading difficulties, by focussing on speed as a critical variable generally in perception and particularly in reading. With the efficient consideration of this issue as the principal purpose of this study the results of certain previously published papers have been drawn upon in this present treatment. Among other these concern, for instance with: the optimization of sightconditions and reading-conditions through the development of appropriate methods, measuring instruments and training apparatus; a close investigation of transfer of information from the tactile to the visual modality (cross-modal transfer of learning). Such previous findings serve as an apt set of starting points for this present analysis concerning identification speed and reading speed. The experiments reported on here are presented chronologically, and the question of their validity and the critical assessment of the problems they identify are discussed in the light of relevant theoretical models and other research on reading difficulties. An appendix presents supplementary items to augment the presently available training and testing materials. I N T R O D U C T I O N The reading process is a complex interaction between sense functions, sensorymotoric behaviour and the brains interpretation of symbolic information received through the senses. The degree and extent of creative interpretation and involvement in the reading material demands therefore that as far as possible the routines of the reading process should be automatic or reflex reactions. In "the olden times" reflex reactions were trained through insistent simple repetition of reading exercises. Reading, and especially reading aloud, became a goal in itself, rather than as a means of learning how to learn. The lack of reading-training might well provide some of the explanation for the deficient reading skills among so many in today's society.In particular the lack of appropriate reading-training may lead to extreme negativeconsequences for those who, in one way or another, are predisposed towardsfinding reading difficult to master, e.g. through dyslexia, brain-damage, bilingualism, or through problems in sight and visual coordination.Slowness in reading, also, is more characteristic of blind readers of braille than of the normally sighted, since the tactile modality requires more overlearning for the achievement of more automatic reading. But it has been shown that it is precisely through overlearning that the blind may become as quick and as accomplished readers as the sighted (McBride 1974; Hunstad and Selnes 1980). 3 Part of the cause of poor reading performance may be found also in the choice of reading-method made at the very start of instruction in reading, and right through the years of schooling. The expectation that teachers may form of the perceptual capacity of the pupil may be so low that it is underestimated, with the result that the right demands are not made for the proper realization of the pupils potential for quick spontaneous reading.The pupil may thus become "stuck" in a vocalization technique that restricts him to a low reading speed. (Crandell and Wallace 1974; Hunstad and Selnes 1980, pp 63-66; Troxel 1967). Those children who either have especially good reading abilities or who have the benefit of extra encouragement for reading, for example from their parents, will gain their good reading-performance "free" and will not encounter the readingdifficulties that others may face. Such examples of "cost-free" learning may be found, for example, among certain children who already from the age of four or five learn on their own how to read, without either their parents or the school influencing them. It is most important that such special children are not considered as setting the standard for what may be expected of children more generally, and nor should examples like these distort the consideration of methods of stimulation and encouragement and reading method that would be appropriate for other children without such special pre-dispositions. The formalistic demands that a teacher might make concerning correct sitting posture, reading distance and choice of reading material might also be inhibiting factors in learning how to read (McBride 1974; Hunstad and Selnes 1980, p 27). Here we shall not enter the old debate concerning the choice of reading method. Surely it is now no longer a matter of "either or", but rather of "both" among specialist teachers of reading skills when they consider the balance of advantages and drawbacks of e.g. the vocalization method, the wholeord method, or the method based on accepting local dialects. The use of the vocalization method alone may all too easily lead to low reading speed. On the other hand though, over-emphasis on the whole-word method may result in the reader encountering words and word-combinations that are not spontaneously recognized. This too may result in low reading speed, especially in the case of new or unfamiliar material. In such cases it might be appropriate that the reader masters the vocalization technique as well as possible. Generally speaking it would seem to be most important that from the beginning of instruction in reading the teacher should emphasize quick and spontaneous identification of letters, words and sentences, later also of paragraphs and even of whole pages (instruction in study-technique). This will give the pupil a general level of security, so that in his own development he might adjust to the learning process according to his individual circumstances and possibilities. It has been made clear that users of CCTV achieve increased reading speed in continuous text when the attention and training is directed towards fast identification of whole words (Hunstad and Selnes 1980). In this investigation though, the subjects were first given some training in the identification of single letters. Increased reading speed in continuous text, in these circumstances may be due to faster combination of letters to words as whole-word comprehension. Perhaps the most reasonable inference to make is that it is due to a combination both of vocalization and whole-word comprehension. As an apt approach towards reinforcing the processes of automation in reading, it was accepted that special over-learning with graphical word-pictures was required