Phonological processing deficit problems of dyslexic children in Tamil Текст научной статьи по специальности «Клиническая медицина»

© Paramadhyalan, P. 2015

This open access article is distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0).

Research article

Phonological processing deficit problems of dyslexic children in Tamil

P. Paramadhyalan

Tamil Faculty, Southern Regional Language Centre, Central Institute of Indian Languages, Mysore, India

E-mail: cpldaya@gmail.com

Dyslexia is best described as a combination of abilities and difficulties, which affect the learning process in one or more of reading, spelling, and writing. The school-age children, including children from all the socio-economic classes, have significant difficulties in learning to read because of their reading disability. Problems in the processing of phonological aspects of language are characteristic of the poor reading skills associated with dyslexia. Dyslexic children typically perform poorly on a wide range of measures of phonological awareness, verbal short-term memory, rapid naming, speech perception and verbal representation, tasks which essentially tap children's representation of, access to, and recall of phonological information (Mutter 2004). The present paper aims to explore errors in reading Tamil made by dyslexic children and find out the problems of dyslexic children in phonological abilities of children with dyslexia.

Keywords

dyslexia; phonology; phonological awareness; verbal short-term memory; rapid naming

For citation

Paramadhyalan, P. 2015. "Phonological processing deficit problems of dyslexic children in Tamil." Language. Text. Society 5 (1): e25-e49. https://ltsj.online/2015-05-1-paramadhyalan. (Journal title at the time of publication: SamaraAltLinguo E-Journal.)

Received: 20 February 2015

Reviewing editor: Andrey G. Kirillov Accepted: 15 March 2015

Published online: 1 April 2015

Abstract

1. INTRODUCTION

The normal phonological development is divided into two parts, dealing with two interdependent aspects of acquisition. The first part focuses on observable phenomena, i.e., the product of acquisition and the second part deals with aspects that are not directly observable, i.e., the process of acquisition.

Phonological development is one of the language development subcomponents used in facilitating discussion of human communication and possible disorder that may result (Angell, 2010). Phonology is the study of speech sounds and sound patterns used to create words. Phonology contains rules that govern the structure, distribution and sequencing of speech sounds and the shape of syllable within words (Owens, 2008). Therefore, the phonological development is the study of how humans develop speech sounds and sound patterns as a part of language development. Phonology is considered a part of the study of language because it takes a broader view of the rules acquired and used, as well as the knowledge that underlies the sound system of language.

Phonological deficit among dyslexics

Problems in the processing of phonological aspects of language are characteristic for the poor reading skills associated with dyslexia. Early reading development proposed that children set up direct mappings between printed words and representations of spoken words in the child's language system (Ehri, 1992; Rack et al. 1994). It follows from this that the status of a child's underlying phonological representation determines the ease with which they learn to read. Since 1980, there have been many studies that point to language difficulties in the dyslexic child, specifically at the level of phonology. Dyslexic children typically perform poorly on a wide range of measures of phonological awareness, verbal short-term memory, rapid naming, speech perception and verbal representation, tasks which essentially tap children's representation of, access to, and recall of phonological information (Mutter, 2004).

Syllabic or phonemic awareness on alpha syllabic orthography

Syllables play a pivotal role in speech planning and speech production and are involved at the interfaces of phonological and phonetic encoding (Cholin et al. 2006). Deficits in dyslexic's reading performance could be at the level of phoneme, syllable or in manipulation of larger units in the words. It has been suggested that phonemes being the smallest units of spoken language and less acoustically pure are difficult for the dyslexics to manipulate than syllables that are acoustically more real and less abstract Spector, 1995 (cited in Mishra, 2006). Indian language orthographies shows more regular mapping between letter sound correspondences. Dyslexic read better on shallow orthography and committed less number of errors.

2. RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODOLOGY

Objectives

1. To explore errors in reading Tamil made by dyslexic children in the age group of 11 to 15 years and to compare them with the control group. Their mother tongue (MT) or first language (L1) as Tamil and learn English as the second language (L2) in schools.

2. To find out the problems of dyslexic children in phonological abilities of children with dyslexia and compare with control group and also the problem faced by those children in their L1 (Tamil).

Research Method

The present work is aimed to evaluate the dyslexic's reading. So the necessary materials have been prepared and the data have been collected mainly in oral reading of dyslexics.

Design

The present study follows a cross sectional experimental methodology and makes a micro level examination of the abilities of phonological processing problems among dyslexic children. A 2x2x5 factorial design has been followed with two different groups (control and experimental), two manipulation of gender (boys and girls) and five cross-longitudinal factors (ages 11, 12, 13, 14 and 15). The abilities of phonology in Tamil are tested by using different dependent variables. A measure of these variables has been obtained through children's responses based on a specially constructed test material for each variable.

Sample selection

Children having different mother tongues are selected as the subjects for the study but; they learn Tamil as first language in the school. For this, a pilot survey has been conducted in eight special schools; and one regular school was also selected on the basis of following conditions.

b. Degree of co-operation extended by the schools for,

c. class observation

d. data collection through test materials

e. personal interaction with students and teachers

f. teaching material observation with teachers

g. Accessibility of schools and availability of required number of students.

The target of the researcher is to collect data from 86 children of experimental group (dyslexic) children from 8 special schools, and 50 children (normal child) from the regular school, [three schools (SS1, SS2 and SS3) are considered to be of high standard, two schools (SS4,

and SS5) are considered to be of medium and three schools (SS6, SS7 and SS8) are considered to be low] in various places in Tamilnadu and Puducherry. Tamilnadu and Puducherry states are the part of south India. Children who speak different mother tongues speakers are in the study because the sample of the criterion is Tamil learning as the first language and English as a second language in the school. As far as possible, by choosing such widely scattered schools, it is ensured that, the sample drawn truly represented the population. A random sampling method was followed. So, they also however, contributed to low and unequal number of observations in each cell in the research paradigm. The sample drawn from various schools are unequal. The sample of the experimental and control group are also unequal.

Table 1 Indicates the schools and samples draw.

SCHOOLS BOYS GIRLS TOTAL

*SS! 10 6 16

*SS2 15 7 22

*SS3 9 5 14

*SS4 7 3 10

*SSs 6 4 10

*SS6 6 2 8

*SS7 3 1 4

*SS8 2 0 2

Total 58 28 86

*RSx 25 25 50

Total 83 53 136

* Name of the schools is avoided to maintain confidentiality.

Sample size

The total sample size is 136. Out of the 136, 86 samples are experimental group 58 boys and 28 girls and 50 samples are control group 25 boys and 25 girls. The age groups of children are between 11 to 15 years. All the children were studying Tamil as the first language but they belong to various mother tongues namely Tamil, Malayalam, Kannada, Telugu, Urdu, Sowrashtra, and Hindi.

Tools for data collection

On the basis of western tool, the researcher constructed a special tool for Tamil language. Test materials are constructed for testing the abilities of phonological skills of the children.

Phonological assessment tool

The test session included eight meta-phonological tasks (auditory task) and one working memory task.

General procedure for data collection

Each child was withdrawn from the regular class room for individual testing, for a period of approximately 30 minutes. Children were asked to sit opposite to the researcher in a quiet room and tested their performance with the tool. Each response was recorded by using tape recorder. The elicitation of other informality is collected by personal interaction with parents and teachers.

The researcher also collected details from the children like the name of the child, age, standard, school, parent's education (both mother and father), parent's income and occupation.

3. ANALYSIS

A t-test and f-test analysis was used for the study. The mean, std. deviation and t-value and f-value are identified by using the SPSS 17.0 package and Microsoft 2007 version is used to all the tabular columns and figures.

Metaphonological awareness

Metaphonology is defined as the conscious awareness of sound structures of spoken language; it implies the capacity to reflect on the structural compounds of words such as syllables and individual sounds. Task that have been devised to measure phonological awareness include alliteration, rhyming, segmentation words into sounds, etc. word awareness is thought to involve an understanding that words are an arbitrary code, separate from the objects they represent, and an awareness that they are individual parts of spoken language (Tunmer & Herriman, 1984). The present study was designed to test the Tamil metaphonological abilities tasks among dyslexic children.

Oral blending of phonemes

Participants are asked to the guess sound and blend the sounds into word. The researcher said three different sounds to the participants then they are asked to blend the sounds into words. Few of the participants could say some of the words correctly and also some of them

committed errors while blending the sounds into words. Numbers are errors are committed by the dyslexic children. One response is given below for each target words.

Categorization of errors

Responses Target word in Phonetic Transcription English Equivah

[mAdAm] [mA+rA+m] 'tree'

['irimbtt] Pe+ri+m+b«] 'ant'

FinAi-pp«] Pi+ni+p+pi] 'sweets'

[p^nAq^l] [uA+n+n.A+p+kA'+l] 'colours'

[ma:nAUAU [ma:+nA+uA+n] 'boy-student'

[pAfrkki:rAn] [pA+^r+k+kr+ra:+n] 'he is reading'

[ku£Aqku] [ku+rA+q+k«] 'monkey'

[ua4Aia:tti] [№+lAi+ia:+t+ti] 'sports'

[u^ltftfAm] [ue+lr+tf+tfA+m] 'light'

[pAmpArAm] [pA+m+bA+rA+m] 'top'

Here, multisyllabic words are given to the dyslexic children with separate phonemes by oral mode. Children were asked to blend the sounds to make words. While blending the sounds, dyslexic children committed errors in various positions of the given task. They show the problems in oral blending of phonemes. They changed alveolar flap [r] sound as voiced dental stop d, front mid short unrounded vowel ['§] as in front high short unrounded vowel [ji], alveolar nasal [n] sound is changed as in retroflex nasal sound [n] and also add back half-closed vowel [a], labial approximant sound [u] as changed into labial stop sound, alveolar nasal [n] sound is changed into retroflex lateral sound [[], back low closed long rounded vowel [a:] is changed into back mid half-closed short rounded vowel [a], alveolar flap sound [r] as in retroflex flap sound [f], front half-close unrounded vowel [i] is changed into back closed rounded vowel [a-:], deleted front half-close unrounded vowel [invoiced labial stop [b] is changed into voiceless labial stop [p]. The mistakes given above are made by the dyslexic children. The normal children made a few mistakes. They committed errors in secondary symbols, because they are not much exposed to the Tamil sounds (graphemes). Mostly they are concentrated in the English language.

Hypothesis

Children with dyslexia are differentiated on oral blending of phonemes than control group.

Table 2. Showing the mean, standard deviation and t-value of the dyslexic children and control group in oral blending of phonemes.

Groups N Mean Std. Deviation t-value P-value

Control 50 0.82 0.83

9.01 0.01

Experimental 86 2.71 1.62

P<0.01 Significant

Table 2 shows that there is a significant difference between control and experimental groups in their oral blending of phonemes. Since the obtained p-value is significant p<0.01. The mean value of experimental groups is 2.71 and the control group mean is 0.82. Therefore the experimental groups made more number of mistakes in oral blending of phonemes than the control group. Here, the null hypothesis is rejected and the alternative hypothesis is accepted by the researcher.

Identifying initial consonant

The administrator asked the participants to identify the initial consonant of the word orally presented to them. In Tamil language no words begin with consonant letter.

Categorization of errors

sponse Target word in Phonetic Transcription English Equivalent

[ku] [kuqAndAi] 'child'

[rA] [rAdAm] 'chariot'

[to:] [ôo^ttAm] 'garden'

[mi] [mirukAm] 'animal'

[pa:] [pa:ttirAm] 'vessel, character'

[Ui] [uisirr] 'hand-fan'

[pa:] [pa:jiri] 'Sun, Sunday'

[fA] [fAttAm] 'law, frame'

[lA] [lAftfijAm] 'goal'

[ia:] [ia:nAi] 'elephant'

[nAnAiT]

'gratitude'

Here, dyslexic children were asked to identify the initial consonant sound by giving the word beginning with vowel-consonant words. Dyslexic children used the vowel-consonant sound instead of consonant sound. They found it difficult to identify the initial consonant sound. The following errors are committed by dyslexic children. [ku] as said instead of [k], [rA] as said instead of [r], [mi] as said instead of [m], [pa:] as said instead of [p], [ui] as said instead of [u], [fA] as said instead of [f], [ia:] as said instead of [i], [pa] as said instead of [n]. Some of the dyslexic children changed the sound itself for examples, retroflex nasal sound [pa:] changed in to alveolar nasal sound [na:], [ôço-:] dental fricative sound changed into dental stop [to:].

Hypothesis

Control and experimental group significantly differ in identifying the initial consonant.

Table 3. Showing the mean, standard deviation and t-value of the dyslexic children and control group in identifying the initial consonant.

Groups N Mean Std. Deviation t-value P-value

Control 50 1.00 1.12

8.18 0.01

Experimental 86 3.14 1.92

P<0.01 Significant

Table 3 reveals that the mean score of the identifying the initial consonant of experimental group value 1.92 is lesser than that of the control group value 1.00. The above result shows that there was significant difference existing between the experimental group and control group. Here the obtained p-value is significant p<0.01. Therefore, the alternative hypothesis is accepted and the null hypothesis is rejected by the researcher.

Identifying final consonant

The participants were asked to identify the final sound of the word, which was said by the administrator.

Categorization of errors

Response Target word in Phonetic English Equivalent

Transcription

[mm] [pAmbAfAm] 'top'

[1] [tAmi-q] 'Dravidian language'

[kAi] [teqgAi] 'coconut'

[n] [kA-n] 'eye'

[rAr] [dofAr] 'follow, series'

[?An] [mAnnAn] 'king'

[l] [9o-l.il] 'profession'

[kAl] [mAkkA^l] 'people'

[sa:t] [pirAsa:t] 'personal noun'

[ta:p] [pirAtrp] 'personal noun'

Dyslexic children have problems to identify the final consonant sound. A few of the dyslexic children said correctly the final consonant sound. Most of the dyslexics are not able to recognize the final consonant sound. They said final syllable instead of final consonant. The examples are follows: The expected response is [m] but the dyslexics' response is [rAm], retroflex lateral approximant sound [-] is said as retroflex lateral Q], instead of front high half-open unrounded vowel [i] is said as [kAi] here the given target word ending syllable is [gAi] voiced velar stop but their response is voiceless velar stop [kAi], alveolar nasal sound [n] is said as retroflex nasal sound [n], instead of alveolar trill sound [r]is said as last syllable of the given target word [fAr]. From the above examples we can easily understand that the dyslexic have problems in identifying the final consonant sound.

Hypothesis

There is a significant difference between the experimental and control group in identifying final consonant.

Table 4. Showing the mean, standard deviation and t-value of the experimental and control group in identifying final consonant.

Groups N Mean Std. Deviation t-value P-value

Control 50 0.46 0.61

7.11 0.01

Experimental 86 1.73 1.45

P<0.01 Significant

The above Table 4 shows the higher mean value (1.73) of experimental group than the control group mean value is (0.46) in identifying final consonant. The results show that there is a significant difference between experimental and control group. Here, experimental group committed higher number of errors in identifying final consonant. Hence, the obtained p-value is significant p<0.01. So the alternative hypothesis is accepted and null hypothesis is rejected.

Phoneme segmentation

Ten words were presented auditorily to the participants who had to successively sound out each of the word's constituent phonemes.

Categorization of errors

Response Target word in Phonetic Transcription English Equivalent

[A+n+fAl] [ApfAl] 'post'

[mA+krq+ffr] [mAkiuffr] 'happiness'

[tA+q+gAm] [tAqgAm] 'gold'

[fo-:+l Am] [fo*:lAm] 'wheat'

[mo:+ffAi] [mo:ffAi] 'hyacinth bean'

[ui:+rAm] [ui:rAm] 'courageousness'

[kurAi+ttAdi] [kurAittAdi] 'bark'

[pAur+^'A+mmr] [pAur^'Amr] 'fool moon'

[ueq+ga:+jAm] [ueqga:jAm] 'onion'

[mo:di+rAm] [mo:dirAm] 'ring'

Children with dyslexia have problem in segmentation the word. They segment only the initial grapheme (sound) correctly; but they faced some problems to segment the remaining part of the word into correct graphemes. They add two syllables into a single segmentation. Normal children also faced some kind of problems in segmentation of the word. Normal children's problems are confusing the lateral and nasal sounds. But the dyslexic children have problem to segment the words. Most of the dyslexics can not segment the final syllable. Few of the dyslexic children have problem in initial syllable itself. The dyslexics have problems in segmenting the gemination sounds.

Hypothesis

The children with dyslexia in phoneme segmentation are significantly differing with the control group.

Table 5. Showing the mean, standard deviation and t-value of the experimental and control group in phoneme segmentation.

Groups N Mean Std. Deviation t-value P-value

Control 50 0.86 0.83

9.04 0.01

Experimental 86 2.88 1.77

P<0.01 Significant

In the above Table 5 the obtained 't' value is greater than the value p<0.0l level. The table shows that the mean score of the phoneme segmentation of experimental group value 2.88 is lesser than that of the control group value 0.86. Here, the control group committed lesser number errors than the experimental group. The above result implies that there was significant difference existing between the experimental group and control group. Hence the t-value is significant. Here, the null hypothesis is rejected and the alternative hypothesis is accepted by the researcher.

Linking letters of sounds

The participants were asked to link the letters of sound from the choice of three letters; they are identity the initial sound of the word.

Categorization of errors

Response Choices Target word in Phonetic English Equivalent

Transcription

[n] [n] [mA] Ma] [mAXAn] 'male child'

[UA] [ua] [mr] [ke-:] [ke^UAfAgi] 'ragi'

№] M Mi] [n] [ku-:n4i] 'cage'

[kAU] [m] [ko:] [kAU] [ko:bufAm] 'temple tower

[ku] [til [ku] [8o-:] [9<>:tti1 'water tub'

[UA] [ua] [n] [U?] [ue-llAi] 'white'

[ne?:] [ne:] [ce:] [l] [ce:UAl] 'cock'

[dAiJ [dAi] [u] [7a:] [?AndAl] 'owl'

[du] [ku] [du] [fAi] [kudlfAl] 'horse'

[pa:] [m] [pa:] [bo:] [bo:mmAi] 'toy'

The dyslexic and few of the normal children have problems in the above task. Both the normal and dyslexic children correctly said the responses before the choices are given. While given the choices they confused the sounds, so the problems in the task. Mostly the dyslexic

children made more number of mistakes. The normal children take some more time to analyze the sound. Even though the dyslexic children take a long time to analyze the skill, they committed errors because of the phonological processing problem.

Hypothesis

Experimental group significantly differs from control group on linking letters of sounds.

Table 6. Showing the mean, standard deviation and t-value of the experimental and control group in linking letters of sounds.

Groups N Mean Std. Deviation t-value P-value

Control 50 0.72 0.88

8.80 0.01

Experimental 86 2.58 1.58

P<0.01 Significant

The result of Table 6 shows that there is a significant difference between experimental and control group in linking letters of sounds. Since obtained p-value is significant p<0.01. Therefore the experimental group committed more errors than the control group. The mean value of experimental group is 2.58 and the control group mean value is 0.72. Researcher accepted the alternative hypothesis and rejected the null hypothesis.

Phoneme oddity task

Administrator said four different words: three words beginning with the same sound and the fourth word beginning with a different sound. The participants were asked to identify the different sound of the word.

Categorization of errors

Vowels

Response

Phonetic Transcription of given words English Equivalent Response

Phonetic Transcription of given words English Equivalent

[ Amma:] 'mother'

[wu:p^Al] 'swing'

[Akka:] for ['ilAi]

PilAi] 'leaf'

[AnnAn]

'elder brother'

[7AnbA"{'pptt] for [Wu:9a1]

[wu:3a1] 'whistle'

[Wu:riya:i]

'pickle'

[Akka:] 'elder sister'

[?AnbA~i;pptt] 'gift'

Response

Phonetic Transcription of given words

English Equivalent

Response

Phonetic Transcription of given words

English Equivalent

Response

Phonetic Transcription of given words English Equivalent

Consonants Response

Phonetic Transcription of given words

English Equivalent

Response

Phonetic Transcription of given words

English Equivalent

Response

Phonetic Transcription of given words

English Equivalent

Response

Phonetic Transcription of given words

English Equivalent

Response

Phonetic Transcription of given words English Equivalent

[WufAl] 'mill stone'

PifAUt] 'night'

Pe^l

'ladder'

[e-wm] [e-qutti] 'letter' PifAki]

['irAki]

'feather'

[AjmbAdi] [?AJUAr] 'five members'

for

for

[WufAl] [e-rimAi] 'buffalo'

['ilAi] 'leaf' for Pe-:n'r] [?AjiAm] 'doubt'

[e-wm] 'thought'

roDd*] 'one'

[7AjmbAdi]

'fifty'

[sAPgi] 'conch'

[tAqgAm] 'gold'

[tuvn'ril]

'fish hook'

[ua:tti]

'duck'

[pAmbArAm] 'top'

[sAPgi] [uAnF]

'vehicle' /malar/ [mAkkA~U 'people'

[tu~n] [tu~n]

'pillar'

[tAnni:r]

[tAqgAm] 'gold' [pA^Am] [pAndi]

'ball'

for [UAnrr] [sAqgAm] 'association' for [tAqgAm] [mAlAr] 'flower' for [1a:i] [tu^kkAm] 'sleep' for [ua:tti]

[tAPgAi] 'younger sister' for [kAn^i] [kAnd*] 'calf'

[sA-tt Am] 'act, law'

[mAnnAn] 'king'

[1a:i]

'dog'

[tAnni:r]

'water'

[pA^Am] 'picture'

The dyslexic children made mistakes in identifying the phoneme oddity task. Due to the lack of concentration the normal children also made mistakes. Dyslexic children made mistakes due to phonological memory problem and conscious compensatory hypothesis problem.

Hypothesis

The experimental and control group differ from one another significantly on phoneme oddity task in vowels and consonants.

Table 7. Showing the mean, standard deviation and t-value of the experimental and control group in phoneme oddity task in vowels and consonants.

Task Groups N Mean „ . ' t-value P-value

Vowels 7.08 0.01

Groups N Mean Std. Deviation

Control 50 0.24 0.52

Experimental 86 1.13 0.94

Control 50 0.32 0.55

Experimental 86 0.95 0.94

Consonants 4.94 0.01

Exper

P<0.01 Significant

From Table 7, it is inferred that the mean values of vowels (1.13) and consonants (0.95) of experimental group is lesser than the mean value of vowels (0.24) and consonants (0.32) of control group. Here the p-value is significant p<0.01. Both the vowels and the consonants are significantly differed from experimental and control groups. Hence, the alternative hypothesis is accepted and the null hypothesis is rejected. From this, the researcher infers that experimental group made more number of mistakes than the control group.

Phoneme deletion

Administrator asked the participants to delete a single phoneme in the word (given to them) in different positions such as initial, medial and final.

Categorization of errors

Initial

Responses Sound Deletion Target word in Phonetic Transcription English Equivalent

[?a:] [7a:mAi] 'turtle'

[mttdAl] [mtt] [mttdAlAi] 'crocodile'

[sttkAm] [?A] [AsttttAm] 'dirtiness'

[mAlAi] [pul [pu^ma:lAi] 'a flower of garland'

[ka:l] [pA] [pAxAl] 'day time'

Medial

Responses Sound Deletion Target word in Phonetic Transcription English Equivalent

[AdAl] [IT] [AITUAl] 'wisdom'

M r^tti] 'vote'

[mAmm] [IA] [mAfA-^'Am] 'death'

[kuppA] M [ku-qAppAm] 'confusion'

[A3tAl] M [nA£A0tAl] 'behaviour'

Final

Responses Sound Deletion Target word in Phonetic Transcription English Equivalent

[kAlr] [ur] [kAlur] 'education'

[ti:u] ["«] [ti:uti] 'an island'

[ua:l] hAil [ua:qAi] 'banana tree'

[pAla:] [kAi] [pAlAkAl] 'board'

[tol] [ur] [to:lur] 'defeat'

Dyslexic children had problems in all position of phoneme deletion. The above examp clearly showed the problem of dyslexics.

Hypothesis

Control group differs significantly from experimental group on phoneme deletion in the position of initial, medial and final.

Table 8. Showing the mean, standard deviation and t-value of the experimental and control group in phoneme deletion in the position of initial, medial and final._

Positions

Initial

Medial

Final

Groups N Mean Std. Deviation

Control 50 0.34 0.52

Experimental 86 1.17 0.91

Control 50 0.62 0.70

Experimental 86 1.28 0.93

Control 50 0.32 0.47

Experimental 86 1.24 1.04

t-value

6.80

4.69

7.08

P-value

0.01

0.01

0.01

P<0.01 Significant

As per the statistical result, table-8 implies that an initial, medial and final position of phoneme deletion is significantly differing in experimental and control groups. It is statistically proved p<0.01. In all the positions such as initial (1.17), medial (1.28) and final (1.24) of the experimental group is lesser mean values of the control group in the initial (0.34), medial (0.62) and final (0.32). So the alternative hypothesis is accepted and null hypothesis is rejected. Therefore it is concluded that the experimental group committed more errors than the control group.

Phoneme substitution

The participants were asked to substitute a sound in a word. Various position of the word such as initial, medial and final was examined.

Categorization of errors

Initial

Response Substituted Sound Target word in Phonetic Transcription English Equivalent

[üa:Pgi] [mu:] > [nA] [m№:ndri] 'three'

[seuAn] [ka:] > [se] [ka:uAl] 'guard'

Bai-üti] [ua:] > [ta:] [ua^qndi] 'having lived'

[kujin] [ku] > [mA] [kujil] 'koel'

[ka:lAm] [ni:] > [kA] [ni:lAm] 'blue'

Medial

Response Substituted Sound Target word in Phonetic Transcription English Equivalent

[muckl] [l] > [tA] [mullAi] 'Arabian jasmine'

[pAttim] [n] > [t] [pAndi] 'ball'

[7a:ka:jAm] [ji] > [ka:] [7a:jirAm] 'thousand'

[perimAi] [ri] > [ra:] [porimAi] 'patience'

[Mrtti] [■F] > [I] [A-qrttAl] 'destruction'

Final

Response Substituted Sound Target word in Phonetic Transcription English Equivalent

[PA~ttT] [ti] > [pa^:tti] 'song'

[ie:tti] [mAi] > [to] [ie:rimAi] 'buffalo'

[pAfAm] [l] > [m] [pa-:£Al] 'song'

[tAlAi] [n>i] > [|ai] [tAUA^'Ai] 'installment'

[ka:tAi] [^Ai] > [tAi] [kA^Ai] 'shop'

The dyslexic children have problem in phoneme substitution skills. Because of the phonological processing problem, they cannot analyze the word to substitute the problems in a given word.

Hypothesis

The experimental and control group differ from one another significantly in phoneme substitution in the position of initial, medial and final.

Table 9. Showing the mean, standard deviation and t-value of the experimental and control group in phoneme substitution in initial, medial and final positions.

Positions

Groups

N

Mean

Std. Deviation

t-value

P-value

Initial

Medial

Final

Control Experimental

Control Experimental Control

Experimental P<0.01 Significant

50 86 50 86 50 86

0.34 1.15 0.52 1.17 0.34 1.10

0.59 1.17 0.58 0.98 0.48 0.91

5.34

4.87

6.42

0.01

0.01

0.01

Table 9 exhibits that, the mean values experimental group in phoneme substitution in the positions of initial (0.34), medial (0.52) and final (0.34) is higher mean values of control group mean values of initial (1.15), medial (1.17) and final (1.10). The obtained p-value is significant p<0.01. So there is significant difference between experimental and control groups. Hence it is revealed that experiment group committed high degrees of error than the control group. Here, the null hypothesis is rejected and the alternative hypothesis is accepted.

Hypothesis

There is a significant difference in experimental group with regard to phonological awareness on the basis of the age.

Table 10. Showing the mean, standard deviation and f-value of the experimental group of phonological awareness through ages.

Groups N Mean Std. Deviation F-value P-value

11 Years 16 35.44 14.55

12 Years 16 30.25 6.78

13 Years 12 27.58 7.33 29.800 0.001

14 Years 24 15.54 6.79

15 Years 18 8.83 3.75

Total 86 22.26 12.94

P<0.01 - Significant

Table 10 shows that there is a significant difference between the ages of the experimental group. Here, mean values of the age groups gradually decrease in the phonological awareness task. Gradual increase in the language acquisition and learning through the ages is possible only in the normal children. For dyslexic children there are always up and downs of their language acquisition. Here the gradual increase of the development of their language is possible because all the children with dyslexia are attending the special schools. Teachers of the special school develop the dyslexic children ability according to their age. The obtained p-value is significant p<0.01. The errors of the dyslexic children are lesser, considered to their chronological age. So the alternative hypothesis is accepted and null hypothesis is rejected.

Working memory

Working Memory (WM) can be defined as a "brain system that provides temporary storage and manipulation of the information necessary for such cognitive tasks as language comprehension, learning and reasoning" (Baddeley 1986).

The conceptualization of a working memory system led to the abandonment of the idea of a single unitary short-term store which also functions as a working memory.

Some of the most convincing evidences in favour of a distinction between short-term memory and working memory came in the last decades from studies of brain-damaged patients who were no longer able to have new lasting memories, but showed a normal performance in short-term memory.

The first unitary model of WM (working memory) proposed by Baddeley and Hitch (1974) was a three-component system, composed of a limited capacity attentional controller, the central executive, and two slave subsystems, one performing operations with acoustic and verbal information, and the other concerned with visual and spatial information.

Due to the need to integrate information from the subsidiary systems and from long term memory allowing at the same time their manipulation and maintenance, a fourth component has

been added to Baddeley's model, the episodic buffer (Baddeley 2000) which has the task of linking information across domains, forming integrated units of visual, spatial and verbal material.

This multiple component model of WM has been highly influential and supported by a huge amount of experimental data, and it has thus provided a "useful conceptual tool in understanding a range of neuropsychological deficits, which in turn have thrown light on normal cognitive functioning" (Baddeley 1992).

Categorization of errors

Response

Phonetic Transcription of given words

English Equivalent Response

Phonetic Transcription of given words

English Equivalent Response

Phonetic Transcription of given words

English Equivalent Response

Phonetic Transcription of given words

English Equivalent Response

Phonetic Transcription of given words

English Equivalent Response

Phonetic Transcription of given

sentences

English Equivalent

Response

Phonetic Transcription of given

sentences

English Equivalent

Response

Phonetic Transcription of given

[mrlkku] [pu^nAi_

_ ku-drkkum]

'Cat drinks milk'. [cinnAdi]

Qa:nAi perriAdi, jeli_

_]

'Elephant is large, rat is small'. [kAttum]

[mAjil 7a-:f um, kujil_]

'Peacock will dance, koel will sing'. [mApfAi]

[tAkka-:li ciuApptt, ua-:.jAkka:j_

_]

'Tomato is red, green banana is green '. [sirA:xa]

[muiAl uekAma:kA tfellttm 7a:mAi_tfellttm]

'Rabbit runs fast, tortoise runs slowly'. [kAripptt]

[pa:lin nirAm uenmAi kArnn nirAm_]

'Milk is white, charcoal is black'. [riba:i]

fen kAijil pAtti_wu-llna]

'There are ten fingers in my hand'. [uAfkki]

[surriAn krqkki tisAijil wu tikkum, _

, tisAijil mArAijum]

sentences

English Equivalent 'Sun rises in the east, sets in the west'.

Response

Phonetic Transcription of given sentences

[na:l]

[na:rka:likki_wU"{[n8]

English Equivalent 'A chair has four legs'.

Resp°nse [ko: ttim]

Phonetic Transcription of given r . . ,. ,

r ° [mi:n ni:ndtm, dafauai_]

sentences

English Equivalent 'Fish swims, bird flies'.

Here the dyslexic children made mistakes in working memory. They cannot retrieve the correct word for the given tasks. They often used the English words correctly to fill the task and also some of children with dyslexia were not able to do this task in English also.

Hypothesis

Experimental and control groups have significant difference in working memory task.

Table 11. Showing the mean, standard deviation and t-value of the experimental and control group in working memory task.

Groups N Mean Std. Deviation t-value P-value

Control 50 0.78 0.84

7.29 0.01

Experimental 86 2.07 1.22

P<0.01 Significant

According to Table 11 the mean value of the experimental group is 2.07, it is lesser than the mean value 0.78 of control group. The statistical p-value is significant p<0.01. There is a significant difference in experimental and control groups in working memory task. From this the researcher said that the experimental group made higher number mistakes than the control group. Hence, the alternative hypothesis is accepted and rejected the null hypothesis.

Hypothesis

There is a significant difference in experimental group of working memory task on the basis of the age.

Table 12. Comparing the mean, standard deviation and f-value of the experimental group of working memory task through ages.

Groups N Mean Std. Deviation F-value P-value

11 Years 16 2.44 1.15

12 Years 16 2.75 1.06

13 Years 12 2.25 0.97 5.446 0.001

14 Years 24 2.00 1.32

15 Years 18 1.11 0.83

Total 86 2.07 1.22

P<0.01 - Significant

Table 12 stated that there is a significant difference in the working memory task of experimental group. As the age increases, children's capability of language development also increases but in the above table the mean values first two are not like that. Remaining mean values gradually decreases. Here the dyslexic children show their ups and downs of the development of language skills. Even though the teachers of the special schools take care on every individual child, some of the children are not capable of developing their language skill to their age level. So the ups and downs are seen in them.

Hypothesis

There is a significant difference in experimental group of metaphonological awareness, working memory task and rapid automized naming letters on the basis of the gender.

Table 13. Showing the mean, standard deviation and t-value of the experimental group of boys and girls in metaphonological awareness and working memory task.

Tasks Gender N Mean Std. Deviation

Oral Blending of Male 58 2.81 1.63

Phonemes Female 28 2.50 1.60

Identifying Initial Male 58 3.28 1.95

Consonant Female 28 2.86 1.86

Male 58 1.90 1.55

t-value P-value

0.839

0.962

1.678

0.405 (NS)

0.340 (NS)

Identifying Final consonant

Female

28

1.39

1.17

Male 58 3.03 1.74

4. Phoneme segmentation

Female 28 2.57 1.81

5. Linking Letters of Male 58 2.83 1.58

Sounds Female 28 2.07 1.49

6. Phoneme Oddity Tasks Male 58 1.17 0.94

(Vowel) Female 28 1.04 0.96

7. Phoneme Oddity Tasks Male 58 0.98 0.98

(Consonant) Female 28 0.89 0.88

8. Phoneme Deletion Male 58 1.31 0.96

(Initial) Female 28 0.89 0.74

9. Phoneme Deletion Male 58 1.34 0.97

(Medial) Female 28 1.14 0.85

10. Phoneme Deletion Male 58 1.38 1.09

(Final) Female 28 0.96 0.88

11. Phoneme Substitution Male 58 1.24 1.32

(Initial) Female 28 0.96 0.79

12. Phoneme Substitution Male 58 1.28 1.04

(Medial) Female 28 0.96 0.84

13. Phoneme Substitution Male 58 1.19 0.96

(Final) Female 28 0.93 0.77

Male 58 2.36 1.12

14. Working Memory Task Female 28 1.46 1.20

Female 28 2.64 1.73

NS - Not Significant

Result of Table 13 infers that except the phoneme deleti

working memory task in other dimensions there is no significan

1.125

2.163

0.622

0.429

0.988

1.890

1.212

1.490

1.358

0.098 (NS)

0.266 (NS)

0.035 (NS)

0.536 (NS)

0.670 (NS)

2.223 0.030 (S)

0.327 (NS)

0.063 (NS)

0.229 (NS)

0.141 (NS)

0.179 (NS)

3.320 0.002 (S)

better in acquiring language skills than boys. The mean values of the girls are lesser than those the boys. The girls are made lesser number mistakes than the boys. The obtained t-value is not significant. Here in majority of task null hypothesis is accepted.

4. DISCUSSIONS

Metaphonological skills were assessed in seven aspects. All the tasks belonged to auditory processes. Working memory task is also assessed to find out the phonological abilities of dyslexic and non-dyslexic children. The following problems are found in dyslexic and non-dyslexic children.

• They shortening the long vowels and lengthening the short vowel.

• They confused with the sounds of nasals and laterals.

• They have problems to discriminate the voiced and voiceless sound.

• They replaced the alveolar sound in to dental sound.

• They replaced the alveolar sound in to retroflex sound.

• Retroflex lateral approximant sound is replaced as retroflex lateral.

• They changed front vowel in to back vowel.

• They have problems to separate the vowel sound and consonant sound in vowel consonant sound.

• They have problems to retrieve from the memory.

• They get confused at the graphemes level.

These problems are faced by dyslexics and non-dyslexics. The reason of the normal children is that they are not much aware with Tamil language. Due to impact of globalization most of the parents put their children in English medium schools. In English medium schools they only focus on English language but they do not give much importance to Tamil language, so the normal children have to face problems to learn Tamil language.

Dyslexic children faced these problems because of the processing deficit hypothesis. Due to the processing deficit hypothesis they have problem in processing the spoken language and an orthographic representation. Another problem is phonological processing deficit because of this problem the dyslexic children cannot discriminate the sounds of the language. Auditory processing deficit is the major problem to the dyslexic children. Due to this problem they are not able to discriminate the sounds of the language. Most of the dyslexic children have double deficit hypothesis problem. Due to this hypothesis they had faced problem to naming the letters, colours, etc., and also phonological processing problem. Dyslexic children have difficulties in automization of any skills because of the automization deficit hypothesis. Children with dyslexia faced difficulties in visual and auditory stimuli. They had fewer magnocells in the visual and auditory pathways. This problem occurred in the dyslexic because of the magnocellar deficit hypothesis. All these problems posit abnormalities in the cerebellum as an underline casual factor of dyslexia. It is because of the cerebellar deficit hypothesis. Dyslexic children brain system provides temporary storage of working memory. So, they have difficulties in working memory task.

Some of the dyslexic children scored as normal children in the different task. It is possible due to the various compensatory strategies used in the special schools. Some of the dyslexic

children have faced problem in the special schools. Those children need more time to overcome from these problems.

The present research supports the fact that delayed phonemic awareness skills are the cause of many reading failures in the dyslexic children. To overcome the phonological deficit problems, the dyslexic children need the metaphonological awareness. Phonemic awareness is an auditory processing skill that permits an individual brain to understand single sound in words and to blend them for reading, then segment them for spelling. Phonemic awareness appears under the umbrella of phonological awareness which is an earlier developing auditory processing skill that allows a child to examine and manipulate language independent of meaning. It includes rhyme, identifying number of sounds in a word, identifying the number of words in a sentence, deleting and substituting a sound in the word. After developing the auditory processing skills, children continue to develop the higher levels in phonemic awareness such as sound matching, production of words with the same sounds, phoneme segmentation, phoneme blending, deletion and substitution. So the research concludes that phonemic awareness is the best predictor of early reading acquisition among dyslexic children.

5. CONCLUSION

Education is one of the most importance aspects of human resource development. There is an urgent need in our country to increase an awareness of this invisible handicap like dyslexia. Dyslexia is a major educational problem in our country. Maximum children with dyslexia are generally ignored and passed unnoticed in schools, until they become dropouts or delinquents. In our country, the Dept. of human resource development takes a number of steps for developing the basic education. The major step is to order the schools not to detain the students up to ninth standard. This step will protect the children from dropout of the school. But it is not proper way to solve this problem. The present study recommends to include the signs of dyslexia and the signs of other types of disabilities in the syllabus of the teacher education because many teachers are feeling unconfident while facing the disability children. There should be an implementation of legislation in the country to develop centers for its proper assessment and accurate diagnosis. Pediatricians, educationists, counselors, psychologists, linguists, speech and language pathologists should join hands in our country for the noble cause of education.

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Declaration of conflicting interests

The author declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author received no financial support for the research, authorship and/or publication of this article. Author information

P. Paramadhyalan works at the Tamil Faculty, Southern Regional Language Centre, Central Institute of Indian Languages, Mysore, India.

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