Running head: HOW THE BRAIN LEARNS TO READ 1

How the Brain Learns to Read

Cathy Johnson
EDU 417
Instructor: Ciara Smack
September 22, 2014









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Teaching literacy is the most important assignment a teacher has in elementary school.
Lack of success in the early years often combines into serious reading deficits by the end of
elementary school. Most students require additional practice activities designed to help them
read more fluently. There are many approaches to reading and strategies can be utilized before,
during and after reading. To understand these strategies one needs to understand the specific
areas of the brain associated with reading and the process by which one learns to read. A teacher
also needs to understand how the brain learns to read in order to better understand their students.
There are various ways and stages that a student must go through to learn how to read. It
is a gradual process. Reading is a difficult, multi-step task that must be actively taught and
learned. Children learn to read by first learning to speak, the alphabet, then words, then
combinations of words learning the shapes of the words and associating them with meaning
comes with it as well There is a section of the brain that links phonetic sounds to the appropriate
letter, then there is a section of the brain to turn them into words. There is another section of the
brain that puts it all together. The brain creates simple associations effortlessly without any
conscious thinking process.
Learning to read is associated with spoken language. Seeing letters is the beginning of the
reading process. There are two areas that are involved in reading: the visual cortex and the
angular gyrus. The visual cortex is part of the cerebral cortex and is located in the occipital lobe
at the lower end of the brain. The primary function of the visual cortex is processing information
about static and moving objects and is excellent in pattern recognition. Visual information is
contained in the light that is reflected from objects(Fischer&Immordino-Yang,2008,p.259).
Electrical impulses are sent from the eye through optical nerves and then to the thalamus. The
thalamus then relays this information to visual cortex located in the occipital lobes.
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The visual cortex also processes auditory too, so its fair to say visual and auditory go
hand in hand. For example you hear a crying baby in the other room, so the visual cortex sends
pictures of babies to correspond to the sound of a crying baby.
The angular gyrus acts as buffer between the visual word recognitions system and the rest
of the language processing system. This is where words are translated from written words to
spoken language. The angular gyrus is considered the inferior parietal lobule (IPL) of the
language dominant hemisphere During reading, the angular gyrus also increased its interaction
with parts of the superior temporal gyrus (Wernickes receptive language temporal region) and
with the midfusiform region, an area previously described as a VWFA( Segal, & Petrides,
2013, p. 2798).
The Wernicke area is where all spoken language is understood, it is where all information
about what a word looks like, how it sounds and what is means. From this point forward
processing of written word follows pretty much athe same pathway as spoken language, going
from the angular gyrus to Wernickes area, across the actuate fasciculus to Brocas area, and if
reading aloud, to the motor cortex( Fischer&Immordino-Yang,2008,p.259). The reading
pathway in the brain starts from the Visual Cortex then goes to the Angular gyrus, to the
Wernickes area, arcuate fasciculus, then to Brocas area to the frontal lobes. So it is imperative
for teachers to understand these general functions, to better understand how to teach these
students and to better understand how neural deficits affect their ability to read. (Fischer &
Immordino-Yang, 2008,p.261).
There are genetic as well as biological reasons that children fail to read. A student that
has Dyslexia has a neurological disorder that affects their ability to read and write. Dyslexia
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comes from an abnormal gene which interferes with the neurons in specific regions of the brain.
These brain regions cannot carry out phonological processing and therefore; As a consequence
of not being able to convert visual language to oral language, the authors text is unable to enter
the language processing parts of the brain, a necessary step in reading, as the human brain is
hard-wired to process only oral language, not other material forms of language(Strauss,2014,
p.35).
Dyslexia can have a gamut of difficulties from major to minor difficulties in making the
most basic passages difficult to decode. It can also be complemented by self-esteem issues,
ADHD and other learning disabilities. Processing problems can also lead into difficulty
understanding social cues and behaving in social acceptable ways. It is a language-based
processing disorder that can deter reading, writing, and spelling and speaking, there are
numerous strategies that can help remediate a dyslexic student which requires a great amount of
flexibility.
The strategies one could implement in ones classroom for students with dyslexia will
benefit all of ones students. Instructions for dyslexia and other learning disorders should consist
of multisensory, structured, systematic, cumulative and direct instruction. They often struggle
with visual and auditory processing issues. They do not learn by site words or by the alphabetical
code and phonetic awareness.
Some supports or instruction strategies a teacher could utilize would be to provide: visual
clues, and or present some type of demonstration during instruction; something to catch their
attention. Understanding sensory contribution is essential in learning because it can help you
develop strategies, and interventions that help children with developmental delays. Teachers can
improve the learning environment by supporting students.
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Children with Dyslexia have an array of behavioral problems because they are
oversensitive to the stimuli in their environment; these behavioral problems impede learning. To
create an effective instruction a dyslexic student would be when others are given independent
work to give them the option to work with headphones on to eliminate distractions.
Break tasks into smaller manageable units. Teachers can provide short intervals for a
break or can use some type of physical activity as this will stimulate the neurons, and do all
kinds of great things for the body and the mind. I also think for attention difficulties providing
material that they are interested in and to increase the auditory memory use poetry, music, or
rhymes to introduce new concepts. We remember meaningful information better than non-
meaningful information so the key to getting ones attention is to find out what they like and use
it as a learning tool.
Allow extra time to complete a test and give them a study buddy. Teach them how to be
organized and to break large projects down into smaller tasks. Facilitate phonemic awareness for
blending and segmenting. I also would have them use their I-phone or other electronic device for
audio recording in the classroom to listen to when home, and also to take pictures of homework
assignments for visual aids.
In conclusion; there are many approaches to reading and strategies can be utilized before,
during and after reading. To understand these strategies one needs to understand the specific
areas of the brain associated with reading and the process by which one learns to read. A teacher
needs to understand how the brain learns to read in order to better understand their students.



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References:
Fischer , K. W., Immordino-Yang, M. H., & , (2008). The Jossey-Bass reader on the brain and
learning. (1st ed.). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
Segal, E., & Petrides, M. (2013). Functional activation during reading in relation to the sulci of
the angular gyrus region. European Journal Of Neuroscience, 38(5), 2793-2801.
doi:10.1111/ejn.12277
STRAUSS, S. L. (2014). The Political Economy of Dyslexia. Monthly Review: An Independent
Socialist Magazine, 66(4), 35-47.
Wolfe, P. (2010). Brain matters: Translating research into classroom practice. (2nd ed.).
Alexandria,VA: Association for Supervision & Curriculum Development.









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