The Wall Street Journal this week highlighted a new study (by acclaimed reading expert Sally Shaywitz) published in the journal Biological Psychiatry that used magnetic resonance imaging to measure the brain activity of poor readers and gauge the brain wave effects of an intensive phonics program. The study provides biological evidence that with the right type of intervention program, poor readers can show improvement by, literally, strengthening the functioning of the relevant portions of their brains. The intensive (105 tutoring hours) phonics-based approach yielded a marked improvement in children's reading accuracy and fluency and continued to be effective long after the tutoring sessions were through. Imaging done a year after the program's conclusion showed that the brain activity of the poor readers did not lapse back to pre-program levels but maintained the level/type of activity that developed over the course of the reading sessions. Standard school-level interventions (special education and tutoring) did not have the same positive effect (either long or short-term) on the brains of poor readers. This suggests that an intense approach emphasizing phonics helps re-train the brains of poor readers to function more like those of good readers.
"Poor readers, given new lessons, show changes in brain activity," by Christopher Windham, Wall Street Journal, April 27, 2004 (subscription required)