A fundamental assumption in the identification of specific learning disabilities (SLD) has been that the presence of a severe discrepancy between ability and academic achievement is a valid marker for the presence of a SLD. This assumption is based on the notion that discrepant low achievers constitute a unique group of children who are different in a number of ways from nondiscrepant low achievers. Several meta-analytic reviews contrasting discrepant and nondiscrepant low achievers fail to reveal significant differences between these two groups on measures of phonetic analysis, pseudoword decoding, word identification, spelling, oral reading fluency and other measures of literacy development and related phonological processing skills. This paper discusses the role of intelligence in identifying children with SLD and presents data based on correlational analyses and hierarchical regression analyses showing that intelligence is not a strong predictor of reading achievement and does not predict responsiveness to remedial instruction. These data also indicate that direct measures of responsiveness to intervention (RTI) strongly predict later reading achievement in tutored children from 1st grade through 4th grade. The combined results suggest that RTI approaches to the identification of SLD may have greater utility than psychometric approaches based on IQ scores or individual profile analysis.
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