Ron Davis Reading

Ron Davis has a fascinating personal story of how he came to develop his approach and methodology of working with Dyslexia.
From what I’ve gleaned from radio interviews over the last 8 years his approach is heavily set in the visual and tactile realms of cognitive transfer. Bear in mind; the visual tactile approach is not mainstream in that a large majority of language research is banks on phonetic development for the cognitive transfer.
Correct me if I’m totally of base but…
The “phonetic camp” trains via repetitive sounding of word parts, too wholes as a way to associatively conjoin pattern recognition of individual letters and combined letters as away if forming parts and whole words. I presume the logic here is that when a child learns to associate parts of speech (sounds parts) with ciphered letters, the two become set into long term memory. This repetition method (i.e., blocked as in stacked like blocks) is a pretty standard way of ‘encoding,” though it is (oddly) predominantly shunned whenever graphomotor or other cognitive tactile skills are required. Well, that’s not wholly true people think its fine for athletic training, aerobics, dance, music etc… Yet, they can’t seem to bridge a gap that the mind and body are intertwined when it comes to the 3 R’s. (sorry -that’s pure commentary.)

The Davis approach stems from his use of clay as a child to build representational forms for the objects that evaded him (material and socio-communicative.) So, I presume that if you see your child is an active visual -tactile learner (molding or constructing) this method may be a good match. I’m also lead to believe that the Davis method works to build a sense of individual appreciation and strength for the differences of perception that dyslexia offers.

You may want to check their web site and see what they say.

[/u](Note: these are commercial sites, they are not academic research based portals)[u]

[i]Main web page
http://www.davisdyslexia.com/
Ron Davis Personal Profile (from Canada)
http://www.dyslexiacanada.com/ron.htm
Referal site.
http://www.dyslexia.com/program.htm
[/i][/u]

It worries me a bit for someone listed as “guest” to be handing out the advice that was just given. I have been teaching reading and researching methods for 25 years. I do not work for any of the programs that IDA endorses. For someone to discount the “other” reading methods that aren’t Davis as “the phonetic camp”. Also, that the language proponents discount visual tactile approaches., hmmmmm Commentary is fine but perhaps the writer needs to educate himself a bit before speaking for the “other side”.

[size=18][/size]First of all, the Davis Method is NOT recognized by the IDA. I have read the “Gift of Dyslexia” and it has some good ideas that can be incorporated into a multi-sensory approach. What it does not do is adequately teach reading in an efficient and effective way. Not to say that they do not have a very vocal and verbose following. I have not participated in but have watched the “reading wars” for many years. There is a reason that the National Institute of Health decided to take a close look at reading. Too much controversy and too many people making claims without the research (that would be empirical research - you know the kind that gets you published in the RESPECTED peer reviewed journals. Highly respected researchers from many fields came to conclusions that have been backed up by brain imaging. Phoneme awareness is necessary for good reading and can be developed. A majority of dyslexics have problems with phoneme awareness. Phonetics IS NOT phoneme awareness. Without phoneme awareness, you cannot learn using a phonics approach. After, yes, before no. If you really want to know which approaches are best and the researched reasons why they work, take a look at the NIHD report. It is free to download or they will mail it to you. Also, become a member of the International Dyslexia Association and go to their conferences. Good programs to look at include: Orton-Gillingham (which most of the good programs are somewhat based on), Lindamood-Bell, Herman, Slingerton, Wilson Language. My personal favorites are Lindamood-Bell and Wilson with a pinch of fluency training. Go to this site’s research pages. Read Joseph Torgeson’s (misspelled?) article called something like: Preventing Reading Failure. Don’t visit sites that are trying to SELL you their books and their programs. If you listen to opinions, check out their experiential background. A good multi-sensory approach is going to integrate Visual, Auditory, Tactile, and Kinesthetic.
Besides this excellent site, visit www.interdys.org
Good Luck. Eileen

From what I understand, there is no research to support the Davis Method. I would look toward the OG based programs.

I agree with Eileen and Leah. For confirmation, read “Overcoming Dyslexia” by Sally Shaywitz and “Straight Talk About Reading” by Susan Hall and Lousia Moats. For that matter, to to the LD Indepth part of this site and read all the articles in the reading category. You will not see names of reliable, research-based reading remediation methods.

Janis

My two cents:

Several years ago perhaps when the Davis Program began my girlfriend gave me a gift of a $35 assessment at the Davis hq. I found it somewhat disappointing, in that the interviewer proudly showed me the walk of fame (individuals with dyslexia) and then, (I kid you not< ) asked me if I could “visualize” what was around the corner and on top of the roof of a building that was near by.

I think I said, Ah, yeah -I guess so, but, I can’t say I really know if what I’m “visualizing” is actually there.
The interviewer returned, It sounds like I’m dyslexic. That was pretty much it.

I walked out scratching my head and shortly after began bolstering my formal educational training with solid (empirical) educational, perceptual, neurological, systems research on learning disabilities & differences. I also do not dismiss new untested systems until I’ve personally looked at them closely.

The Davis approach is novel, and I think I can see where the Guest with the “camps” comment, and eileen “in shock” are coming from.

From the Davis vantage there has been little research to substantiate a paradigm of cognitive visual template transfer to reading. This is unfortunate, yet, they don’t seem to be researching or supporting research to bolster this approach. From what I’ve found so far a wholly visual patterning link to re mediating reading can be limited to visual templates memory store issues, as well as other conflicts that personalized mnemonic methods present.

And eileen, you said it better than I could.

So with that, and three cents more we can buy a jawbreaker or, jelly bean surprise.

Bill

Great post, Bill!

One major correction to my comments, I started to say that you would not find Davis mentioned as a research based reading method in the articles on this site, and then I decided to be more positive and say that you will find names of research based methods. What came out in print was the opposite of what I was meaning. Maybe I have some kind of disorder, who knows!

Janis

Hey what gives? I guess I was logged out, sorry.
Just for the record, I posted the “two cents” comment above.

Didn’t want to be confused with the Guest in this chain of posts.

Cheers,
Bill

My son learned the Davis method while at a learning center for remediation of his reading disability. He was about eight or nine years old and while there were definite phonological deficits, there were other visual symptoms. Words seemed to move on the page, reversals, difficulty tolerating reading. We had already done vision therapy. The clinic felt that he had the kind of disorientation that Davis talks about. My son is very creative and very able to visualize things. Anyway, he did make many of the trigger words out of clay. He learned to hold his “minds eye” still, a process which actually made him “sea sick”. Due to financial constraints we did not stay at the clinic. We have always tried to get his school to provide programs for him during his school day…another long story.

So, I think Davis has some merit and may address the needs of some children. In the course of caring for my son and improving my skills as a special education teacher, I have tried to find the broadest approach. Rather than seek out one place devoted to one, their own, methodology, I sought out professionals with a broad range of experience who could use a variety of programs to teach my son. So, our origional poster may be able to find a specialist that uses a variety of proven methods, but also has some other possible methods, such as Davis, to teach children who have complicated issues.

Thanks for the balance Angela,

In fairness -I’ll have to agree that the Davis visual tactile approach can have some merit. It’s very unfortunate that there is scant research on how these two communicative senses might shape language and learning. My personal experience perceives sounds as shapes; e.g., an “r or o” sound appears spherical whereas an “e or z” has a pointed form. Maybe this leads into the natural use of ones hands while trying to describe something. :?

Wow, I’d forgotten about the “minds eye exercise to quell the shifting of letters on the page. As I recall, I can see how it could bring on a sense of sea sickness or, a feeling of a brewing headache. Then I might have been doing it wrong or, just didn’t feel comfortable with the altered proprioceptive sense that came from crossing my eyes to refocus my focal point. :oops:

Following up on a comment that as made about the sales aspect of the Davis program. It’s easy to recall several sites and learning programs that have been posted on this site that have an underlining commercial connection. I believe that the moderator of (or one of…) this bulletin board sells her goods in tandem with a note to her site and advise.
This may be the nature of the beast. :wink: I often come across research papers that are commissioned or produced by educational material companies. These like any others need to be read carefully. So it appears that we learn to live and work within varying shades of gray.

Regardless, this doesn’t diminish or distract from the value of the comparative exchange, and interpersonal worth of the experiences that are shared on LDonline (does it?).

Speaking of dizzy (and dangling participles), the altitude of this soapbox is beginning to get to me. I’d better give all involved a break for a while and head-too a “sea level” vacation, -even if it’s in a bucket.

Bill

I thought the post was pretty well balanced — it clearly stated that the sites were commercial, it didn’t push it… and made intelligent commentary about who it would be appropriate for. Made it totally and completely clear that this was one man’s contribution, and yes, that has obvious disadvantages over something that’s been honed and developed by the number of folks who’ve been working on OG programs — but I’ve been in some discussions by Davis users and they’re the kind of instructors who look for solutions — and who don’t think they have “the” answer. It hasn’t been around as long as OG either.
I’m a big supporter of IDA and what they do, and given the choice I would pick an OG program — I’m familiar with it and have seen it work a whole lot of times. So I would not have made that recommendation. However, I sure don’t have a problem wiht “Guest” making it… and the vagaries of this bb mean I am not going to pass judgement on somebody for being one. That post did not have the “Oh, Goody, I’m Anonymous!” taste at all. :!:

I am associated with the Davis Dyslexia Association, and have been since 1995. I got involved in 1994 after Davis methods helped my son become a fluent and capable reader.

I just want to respond to a few points.

First, the user who posted as “guest” does not appear to be affiliated with the Davis association in any way, but correctly pointed to several web sites with more information. The user’s description of Davis methods is somewhat unusual — it is not inaccurate, just not the choice of words or description that anyone trained in Davis methods would likely use. So I would think that the user probably is accurately representing himself/herself as someone with a passing familiarity.

Secondly, Davis currently has a classroom-based program for primarly level readers, and also an individualized, one-on-one program to address dyslexia, geared mostly to older children (age 8+), teenagers, and adults. The classroom program was piloted and researched over 7 years with results published in a peer reviewed journal.

Information is here:
http://www.davislearn.com/research.htm

The individualized dyslexia program was developed through clinical application, observation and experimentation in 1981, and was in use for almost 15 years by the time Davis’ first book, The Gift of Dyslexia, was published in 1994. Many Davis providers in the US work closely with or under contract to local school districts to provide services to individual students.

Davis reading methods are geared to building fluency and comprehension skills based on methods that utilize the strong creative and problem-solving skills that dyslexic individuals have. The methods focus on word meaning and visual word recognition (morphological and graphemic understanding), rather than phonetic decoding strategies. Davis starts with working toward mastery of the small function words of language, which also are the most commonly encountered words in print - thus a student who has mastered the Davis “trigger” list also will have strong sight recognition skills for most of the words encountered in print.

The latest brain scan research suggests that dyslexic adults who have developed strong reading comprehension skills do so by developing what researchers such as Sally Shaywitz characterize as “compensatory” systems, bypassing the area of the brain used for phonetic decoding (left temporal regions) and instead relying on right brain and both right and left frontal regions for reading. Dyslexic adults whose brains follow that reading pattern have reading comprehension skills that are indistinguishable from their non-dyslexic counterparts and are accurate readers, although reading speed may be less, and (since they don’t rely on phonic pathways) they have difficulty with purely phonic tasks such as nonword reading.

Dyslexic adults who do not develop this alternative reading pathway, but instead show brain use more similar to non-dyslexic readers, seem to become what Dr. Shaywitz calls “persistently poor readers”. Research from the NIMH shows that among adult readers, the more the brain use pattern looks like a non-dyslexic reader (with increased left-brain blood flow), the worse the reading skill — and vice versa.

I have posted a summary of this research along with illustrations at http://www.dyslexia.com/science/different_pathways.htm

Davis dyslexia methods produce excellent and sometimes seemingly extraordinary results in the students who go through the standard program with qualified providers. Reading gains of up to 6 grade levels in a week have been independently documented by outside testers in many cases. (The big jumps occur with older readers; there is nothing about Davis that would enable a child to read above the expected level for their age. It isn’t magic - it is just an approach that is geared to eliminating barriers that have not been addressed with other programs.)

The methods are not for everybody; they require a high level of motivation and a good ability to work independently after completion of the initial intensive program. Davis providers screen carefully to make sure that students have the appropriate learning style, and strongly encourage parents to read The Gift of Dyslexia to ensure that the family understands the basic methods and the theory behind them.

I am happy to answer any questions that people may have about the methods, research and theory.

-Abigail Marshall
Webmaster, http://www.dyslexia.com/
Email: [email protected]

there is more than one way to correct learning problems.

To me, if someone can make gains from a program, I would go with it, research or not. I understand the kind of people that the Davis program would help. I have read the book and the program makes a lot of sense to me, but of course it is only for certain people. A good Davis provider will be able to screen a person and tell if the Davis methods will provide correction or not. I [b]have[/b] seen it do remarkable things. I know some of you are skeptical, but be sure you are keeping an open mind. There may be other programs and methods out there that actually may be better than the ones you are constantly promoting.

BTW, I am NOT a Davis provider or affiliated with the company in anyway, but a public school teacher who is constantly searching for programs that will benefit my students who deserve the best that I can give them. If I can find something that will help, I will use it.

Abigail posts what looks like good professional information. However, the last time she posted, I went to the trouble of looking up her references and checking out that they said what she claimed. They did not. Her summary was a list of misquotations and misinterpretations. In several cases she had turned the research conclusions around and said the exact opposite. Before you spend the huge amounts of money on this program, check out the research yourself or have someone in the teaching profession check it and see if it really does support Davis. So far nothing I have seen including her own references does.

The article I posted was based on reading the ACTUAL, full length published articles that were cited.

I have found that, particularly with dyslexia research, short abstracts, summaries, and press accounts tend not to accurately reflect what is in the articles. For example, neither Dr. Shaywitz’s book nor press accounts fully explain what is in her latest research.

The reason I am careful to cite references to statements about science or research is simply to enable those who are seriously interested to read the actual articles or underlying research. Again - I would caution people not to accept an abstract or summary as an accurate representation of the research, as I do see situations where the abstract seems to say something quite different than the article itself. In my website article, I have linked to abstracts - and of course the abstracts won’t have all the information I reported on - but that simply is because the full text research articles themselves are copyrighted and not available without payment — so I am not able to link to the full text.

I think this is just the nature of trying to summarize very complicated research in a few paragraphs — it is like trying to understand the news by only reading the headlines. You can get the gist, but you can also get led pretty far astray by lack of explanation or details. I think this is probably where Guest10 has gotten confused in the past — since he/she doesn’t choose to identify herself/himself, I can’t really say.

It does take a lot of work to read and understand some of the scientific research, particularly work done with brain scans or genetics. Also, most of the scientific research articles are not always readily available, though in my experience if you write to the researchers, they are always happy to send a copy of their report.

Of course, some research is subject to more than one interpretation; usually (but not always) if you read the research articles the scientists themselves recognize this and point out issues which need further research or clarification. For example, Dr. Shaywitz believes that the compensated dyslexic readers (the ones who are bypassing the phonetic system) represent a different, genetically-based type of dyslexia than the persistently poor readers — but since she is not a geneticist, that is merely one theory as to why she would see two different outcomes. The press widely reported Dr. Shaywitz’ comments in her report as being one of the finding of the study, even though she herself characterized the statements about two kinds of dyslexia as being speculation.

I choose to reply to this thread under an alias because of the personal attacks made on dissenters by certain overly enthusiastic Davis supporters. I would prefer not to have to.

Abigail seems to be saying that the reason her reports were directly contradictory of the research published is that we are not up to her advanced level. If we don’t feel there is enough information on her posts or the website or articles for the general public, we can link to the research. But if we link to the research and that still doesn’t support her claims, then we have to write to the authors and get the full version and go through that. And if that still doesn’t support her, no doubt there is another level where we aren’t good enough to follow. Sorry, I don’t buy it. Either you can quote your support directly or it is not great support.

In the previous discussion when I spent some time looking up her references, she made a flat claim that a certain piece of research disproved the effectiveness of certain phonetic programs. However the links made absolutely no mention of these programs, and the major study was in a foreign country in a different language where the particular program supposedly disproved could not possibly have been used. This is at the very least a misinterpretation and/or exaggeration.

Again, I am deliberately avoiding making this into a personal fight. Those of you who have academic experience in plowing through papers, please take a little time on the support links given and see if you think they are real support for this program or not. If there are several voices of reasoned thought here, parents can get an idea.

Excuse me, Guest10 - you don’t seem to understand what I said.

The web article I wrote is not contradictory of the research, they are taken FROM the research. They are, to the best of my ability, accurately representing what the research seems to show.

I said that what I wrote is taken from the actual research article, and NOT from an abstract or newspaper account, and I was trying to caution against relying on such abstracts or press reports.

If you are the person I think you are, then I think your problem with me is that a few months ago I cited to something that was contained in one of the subcommittee reports of the National Reading Panel, but is not contained in the summary report. My impression at the time was that you were relying on the summary and therefore concluded erroneously that I had presented untrue information.

In any case, I’m talking about brain research now, and as noted, you (or anyone else) can read the research and draw your own conclusions.

Again you suggest that I and others are incapable of finding or reading the research. I read your links and then read the other links to them, and they did not support the claims you made. If you do have scientific backing, then you should be able to quote it directly. Referring to reports that are unavailable to other readers and telling us to take them on trust is not in the tradition of open academic discourse and makes your conclusions qt the very least questionable.

I am a parent of a 10 year old son in 5th grade who attends Learning Lab and Gifted programs in a public elementary school. He has made a lot of progress in the past 3 years since attending the Learning Lab and receiving Reading/Spelling Mastery Instruction in this daily pull out program.

He still continues to have the same bad habit of skipping words, guessing words, losing his place on the line, reversing d/b of/from, even though he can decode pretty well now.

Since he was 3 years old, he has already been through speech therapy for fronting, Fast Forword for auditory processing deficits, Lindamood Bell LiPS, Reading Reflex Phonographix, Vision Therapy software (he continues to have a slight over-convergence), Lexia Learning (phonics), and Soliloquy Reading Assistant (fluency). I have read “Overcoming Dyslexia” and I think I did everything Dr. Shaywitz suggests and more. Also, I read “The Gift of Dyslexia” but I could not conceive of the “mind’s eye” and “disorientation” so I pretty much dismissed it except that a friend of mine had seen very good results with her 8th grade daughter.

We read books together every night although he still hesitates to read along or take his turn and prefers me reading to him.

I was wondering if the Davis Method would correct the same bad habit he has had throughout all the phoneme awareness, fluency, etc. training he has already received. None of it has corrected the skipping and reversing and guessing he does. Although, believe me, he is GREATLY IMPROVED!
I am starting to get concerned about middle school and was thinking that maybe the Davis Method would be something that could finally correct this ongoing problem.

I would not recommend the Davis program for accuracy problems; as far as I have seen and read Davis does not do much of anything for accuracy.

I have posted here and on other parts of LDOnline my own approaches to teaching accuracy. Feel free to read my old posts and use these approaches. They take time but are tried-and-true.

You can also email me for advice at [email protected]
I’ve been having computer problems since the summer so haven’t been able to give the long answers some people deserve, but hope to get the problems corrected in a week or two.

(I am not selling anything, quite the opposite.)

We too have done many programs (Fast ForWord, LiPS, PG, Davis) yet our son did not seem able to read with some automaticy and fluency. Recently we have done Read Right, in the comfort of our own home via telephone. It has greatly improved our son’s ability to read three or four pages at a sitting with wonderful fluency. Check out their website www.readright.com. He started in July and will soon be done, able to read close to grade level.

Angela:
I checked into READ RIGHT and it sounded a lot like Read Naturally and Soliloquy Reading Assistant. Basically a fluency and comprehension type tutoring system. They charge $90 for a non-refundable evaluation and then you buy a library of reading books for $200 - $700. The tutor will work with 2 children for 1 hour, usually twice a week for $38 an hour by conference call for a number of months. It was hard to tell from their web site and discussion with someone at their office exactly what makes their program different. They have some sort of money-back guarantee.

Victoriah:
I am also interested in the tips that you have to offer on reading accuracy. I was not able to glean them from your previous posts. I appreciate any advice you can offer.

Thanks!

Cybersmom,

Have you considered trying the Davis method yourself using the book? That might give you better insight into whether or not it would be worth taking out a loan. I do think it is helpful to some children — specifically those with a disorientation problem. However, the problems you describe can be from other causes. It would be a shame to take out a loan in order to do the Davis program, only to find out it wasn’t what was needed for your particular child.

Another suggestion is to try a cognitive skills training program first. Vision therapy is wonderful for correcting visual efficiency problems (such as convergence and accommodation), but does not necessarily do much for developing cognitive skills — things such as visual attention to detail, visual sequencing, visual short-term memory, etc. In particular, VT does not do much for developing automaticity of the cognitive skills.

Audiblox is an inexpensive home cognitive training program that can be very helpful (http://www.audiblox2000.com ). PACE is another great program (http://www.processingskills.com ), but costs several thousand dollars, which puts it more on a par with a Davis program.

Nancy

For $150 this program sounded like it would be worth a try for my son’s visual learning style. Thank you for making me aware of this method of fundamental skill remediation as an alternative to PACE.