Leitura recombinativa e habilidades sociais acadêmicas em crianças com dificuldades de leitura

Abstract

The relationship between academic performance and social skills has been documented by several correlational studies. However, few experimental studies were found investigating the relationship between teaching and emergence of recombinative reading and academic social skills in children. The objective of the present research was to evaluate whether the explicit teaching of syllable discrimination and emergence of recombinative word reading, copying and dictation (academic performance) promotes changes in academic social skills in children with reading difficulties. Academic social skills were measured in a child in the 3rd year of elementary school at a public school, before and after teaching syllable discrimination and testing the emergence of new verbal performances with words. Partial emergence of recombinative reading was verified in the textual reading and word comprehension tests, as well as copying and dictation. After these tests, an increase in the frequency of general academic social skills and in the occurrence of categories was documented, in addition to a decrease in behaviors indicative of academic difficulty. The results corroborate studies that documented the inverse relationship between academic performance and academic social skills, diverging in the most common categories in low-performing students. It is suggested to insert more refined measurement instruments for parents and teachers, comparing the natural situation with the formal structured one for recording and careful identification of social interactions.