Tracy Packiam Alloway, PhD

Students with dyspraxia (DCD) can also have comorbid language impairments (SLI). While these developmental disorders are distinguished by the domain of principal deficit, they are both associated with significant learning difficulties. Studies that followed 7-year olds with dyspraxia found that they struggled with reading and comprehension by the time they were 10 years old. I wanted to know whether the combination of motor coordination difficulties plus language impairments lead to worse learning outcomes compared to those with only motor coordination difficulties or language impairments. I looked at three groups of students: 1) those with SLI but no dyspraxia; 2) those with dyspraxia but normal language skills; 3) those with dyspraxia + language impairments.

There were two key findings. First, visual-spatial memory was the single best test to successfully distinguish a student with dyspraxia from those with language impairments. If you have a student with dyspraxia but normal language skills, their memory profile is the same as those with dyspraxia + language impairments: they will have marked difficulties in visual-spatial working memory. The second finding was that despite relative strengths in language, those with dyspraxia but no language impairments performed as poorly as the group with dyspraxia + language impairments. This means that for a student with dyspraxia their working memory abilities determine their learning difficulties. Any strength in language that they have is not able to sufficiently support their learning. If their working memory is not addressed, then any additional strengths they have, such as in language, will not provide a sufficient platform for learning.

Alloway and Archibald (2008). Journal of Learning Disabiliities. READ

There is exciting research emerging on the benefit of brain training. The question is: what works? Is it enough to memorize numbers in backwards order? Previous research outlines programs where students remember number sequences for a few weeks. Although improvements in working memory were reported, there are clear limitations. Most notably, there was no transfer effect: training working memory did not improve academic attainment. This leads to the possibility that some brain training programs are just ‘training for the test’, which means you are just getting better at playing the training games.

In order to address this issue, I recently conducted a clinical trial with two groups of students: the Training group participated in a working memory training program (www.JungleMemory.com) and the Control group received targeted educational support (IEP). The two groups did not differ in their IQ, working memory, or academic scores pre-training.

Both the Training and the Control groups underwent 8-weeks of their respective training programs and then were retested on the IQ, working memory, and academic tests.

The results were dramatic. The Control group did not perform much better without intervention, and in some instances they performed even worse in math and working memory.

In contrast, the Training group demonstrated a clear improvement not only in IQ and working memory tests, but crucially in learning outcomes as well. Students on the working memory training program went from a C to a B, or a B to an A after just 8 weeks of training! This is an exciting step in demonstrating that the right brain training can significantly boost academic attainment.