Reading Disabilities

Abstract

A basic problem of urban school systems is their difficulty in teaching many black and Puerto Rican children in poverty areas to read. A theory of cognitive integration is one possible answer to this problem. The theory holds that many black and Puerto Rican children have difficulty in making total integrated responses to words and that this is indicative of a deeper problem of cognitive disintegration, which blocks not only the child's reading of words but his comprehension as well. The developmental basis of such difficulties, when the writings of Hunt, Piaget, and Hebb are considered, lie in a poverty of key tactual and emotional experiences at crucial stages in development, causing difficulties in coordinated neural functioning, which can form the basis of cognitive dysfunction. Possible remedies for such problems lie in the use of a reading and cognitive development design, which stimulates diagnosis at every stage, learning at an individual pace, rejection of any unidimensional programs, and support for a multi-method treatment approach.