Lees- en spellingagterstande van leerders met serebrale gestremdhede: Interaksie van werkgeheue, fonologiese prosessering en visueel-ruimtelike aspekte tot leer

Abstract

The causes and characteristics of the reading and spelling deficits of learners with cerebral palsy (CP), as well as the working memory processing are discussed. Due to the vision, hearing and speech disabilities of these learners, the phonological loop in the working memory receives and rejects an unclear message, because the sub-vocal repetition store in the phonological loop does not know how to process it. Thus the phonological loop is interrupted and these learners cannot develop the phonological awareness needed for reading and spelling skills. Therefore, traditional teaching strategies are of no value to teach these learners. However, the plight of these children is that many teachers in South Africa are not trained to support this language-processing problem in these learners. Possible intervention strategies for supporting the phonological loop of CP learners are discussed. Visual imagery and the Davis strategies have been identified as suitable intervention strategies for supporting the reading and spelling deficits of learners with CP. The value of this theoretical paper is that it could provide teachers who have no training to support the language-based problems of children with CP early in their lives with some information about intervention strategies.

Keywords: Cerebral Palsy, Reading and Spelling Deficits, Phonological