Effects of an Adaptive Phonological Training Program on Reading and Phonological Processing Skills in Arabic-Speaking Children With Dyslexia

International audienceWe examined the effects of an adaptive phonological training program on the enhancement of three processing abilities, namely phonological awareness (PA), rapid automatized naming (RAN), and verbal short-term memory (STM) as well as word and pseudo-word reading in Arabic speaking children with dyslexia. An experimental group (n=20; mean age=129.74 months) was compared to an age and reading matched control group (n=20; mean age =126.9 months) from grades 4 and 5. The phonological training program focused on the mental representation of phonemes, their identity, and positions in the words. The experimental group outperformed controls in all posttraining measures for reading words and pseudo-words as well as phonological processing components. Findings indicating a strong relationship between phonological processing and reading efficiency are discussed in terms of reading-related skills gained through training