Dyslexia State Exam

Question 1

504 Plan

Answer 1

Free appropriate public education (FAPE) for each qualified student with a disability, regardless of the nature or severity of the disability.

Provision of regular or special education and related aids and services
[reasonable accommodations] designed to meet the student’s individual
educational needs.

Question 2

Accomodation

Answer 2

Changes in the curriculum, instruction, or testing FORMAT OR PROCEDUREs
that enable students with disabilities to participate in a way that allows
them to demonstrate their abilities rather than disabilities.

Generally considered to include assistive technology as well as changes in presentation, response, timing, and tasks that do not fundamentally alter the intent.

Do NOT invalidate assessment results and do not fundamentally alter the requirements or course expectations.

Question 3

Adaptation

Answer 3

Changes to ACTUAL curriculum, instruction, or assessments that enable a student with a disability that significantly impacts performance an opportunity to participate.

Adaptations include strategies such as orally reading a test, using spelling/grammar check for language arts assessments, and
substituting out-of-level testing.

Adaptations DO alter requirements, invalidate assessment results, and provide non-comparable results.

Question 4

Accurate and Fluent Word Recognition

Answer 4

Ability to read words quickly and accurately and read at a sufficient rate to
support comprehension.

Question 5

Alphabetic Principle

Answer 5

The principle that letters are used to represent individual phonemes in
the spoken word

CRITICAL for learning to read and spell.

Question 6

Assessment

Answer 6

The act or process of gathering data in order to better understand the
strengths and needs of student learning.

Question 7

Assistive Technology

Answer 7

Any item, piece of equipment, software, app, or extension that is used to
support the individual functional needs of a student.

Question 8

Automaticity

Answer 8

Automatic accurate word recognition when reading.

Question 9

Comprehension

Answer 9

The “essence of reading” the process of simultaneously
extracting and constructing meaning through interaction and involvement
with written language involves the reader, the text, and the activity or purpose all situated within the sociocultural context.

Question 10

Decoding

Answer 10

Ability to translate a word from print to speech, usually by employing
knowledge of sound-symbol correspondences; also the act of deciphering
a new word by sounding it out.

Question 11

Deficit in Phonological Component

Answer 11

Difficulty pronouncing, remembering, or thinking about the individual
speech sounds that make up words.

Question 12

Diagnostic assessment

Answer 12

A form of pre-assessment that allows a teacher to determine students’
individual strengths, weaknesses, knowledge, and skills prior to
instruction.

Question 13

Differentiated Instruction

Answer 13

Actively planned instruction aligned to students’ learning differences.
In a differentiated classroom, teachers divide their time, resources, and efforts to effectively teach
students who have various backgrounds, readiness and skill levels, and
interests.

Question 14

Dyslexia

Answer 14

A specific learning disability in reading that is neurobiological in origin,
characterized by “difficulties with accurate and/or fluent word recognition
and by poor spelling and decoding abilities.”

Question 15

Dysgraphia

Answer 15

The condition of impaired letter writing by hand, that is, disabled handwriting. Impaired handwriting can interfere with learning to spell words in writing and speed of writing text.

Question 16

Encoding

Answer 16

To write or spell a word.
Ability to translate a word from speech to print.

Question 17

Evidence-Based Practices

Answer 17

Practices in teaching backed by high-standard, quality research and
scientific studies that have been replicated with positive outcomes.

Question 18

Executive Function

Answer 18

Use of the set of mental skills including working memory, flexible thinking,
and self-control. Executive functioning is controlled by the frontal lobe of
the brain.

Question 19

Explicit Instruction

Answer 19

Concepts are clearly explained and skills are [directly] modeled, without
vagueness or ambiguity.

Question 20

Fluency

Answer 20

Accurate reading of connected text at a conversational rate with
appropriate prosody (expression).

Question 21

IDEA 2004

Answer 21

Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. This law makes available a free
appropriate public education to eligible children with disabilities
throughout the nation.

Question 22

IEP

Answer 22

A program that is developed to ensure a child with an identified disability as defined by law is receiving specialized instruction and appropriate related services such as
accommodation and/or modification. The plan includes goals and
objectives specific to the child’s learning needs.

Question 23

Listening Process

Answer 23

The process of making meaning from what we hear. This includes listening, vocabulary, background knowledge, and attention.

Question 24

Morpheme

Answer 24

Smallest meaningful units of language that contains both sound and
meaning — linguistic entities that may be whole words, parts of words, or
single phonemes.

Question 25

Morphology

Answer 25

The study of the structure and forms of words, including derivation,
inflection, and compounding.

Question 26

Motivation

Answer 26

The desire to attain an objective or goal. May be influenced by both
extrinsic and intrinsic factors.

Question 27

Multisensory/mulit-modal

Answer 27

The use of more than one of the visual, auditory, kinesthetic-tactile,
and/or articulatory motor strategies to enhance memory and learning of
written language.

Question 28

Multi-Tiered System of Supports (MTSS)

Answer 28

A comprehensive multi-tiered system of support that includes both
behavioral and academic support systems. Response to intervention (RtI) is part of a MTSS system.

Question 29

Neural Pathway

Answer 29

Connections in the brain enabling signals to be sent from one region to
another.

Question 30

Neurobiological/ Neurological in origin

Answer 30

“Differences in the development, organization, structure, and functioning
of the very specific brain systems necessary for reading. While the
neurological origin of dyslexia in an individual is presumed, it is not
necessary to require medical assessments including neurological,
neuropsychological, or neuroimaging to identify dyslexia”

Question 31

Orthography

Answer 31

The writing system of a language—specifically, the correct sequence of
letters, characters, or symbols.

Question 32

Phonemes

Answer 32

The smallest unit of sound in a word (e.g. step has four phonemes: /s/
/t/ /ĕ/ /p/; church has three phonemes: /ch/ /ur/ /ch/)

Phonemes are described by their position in a word: initial (first),
medial (middle), final (last)

Question 33

Phonemic Awareness

Answer 33

Refers to the ability to consciously manipulate individual phonemes in
a spoken language.

Phonemic awareness is often assessed by the ability to tap or count
every sound heard in a word like cat: /c/ /ă/ /t/ (Bear et al., 2016), to
verbally blend individual sounds into a word, to manipulate sounds
(e.g. exchange the /c/ in cat for a /b/ to make bat), to manipulate syllables, and to produce rhymes.

Question 34

Phonics

Answer 34

The systematic relationship between letters and sounds in a written
alphabetic system.

Question 35

Phonological Awareness

Answer 35

The awareness that spoken language is composed of separate words that make up sentences and that words are made up of syllables.

Including word boundaries, stress patterns, syllables, onset-rime units, and phonemes.

Question 36

Progress Monitoring

Answer 36

An assessment system used to assess students’ academic performance, to
quantify a student rate of improvement or responsiveness to instruction, and to evaluate the effectiveness of instruction.

Question 37

Prosody

Answer 37

The ability to orally read text expressively, with appropriate pacing,
phrasing, and intonation.

Question 38

Research-Based Instruction

Answer 38

Instructional approaches that have been identified through research as
being effective at increasing student learning.

Question 39

Response to Intervention (RtI)

Answer 39

A multi-tiered approach used by educators to help identify and support
students who are struggling with a skill. All students need to receive
high-quality instruction and universal screening in Tier 1.

Targeted
interventions with increased intensity are implemented in Tier 2 and Tier 3 with continued progress monitoring.

If a child does not respond to the initial interventions, more focused interventions are used to help the child
master the skill.

Question 40

Specific Learning Disability

Answer 40

“A neurobiological-based processing disorder leading to difficulties in
acquiring knowledge and skills to the level expected of those of the same
age and ability.”

Question 41

Spelling and Decoding Abilities

Answer 41

Ability to read unknown words by using phonics and syllable patterns and
to spell words accurately according to the English language system.

Question 42

Strategies

Answer 42

Instructional techniques (scaffolds) used to develop and strengthen student’s skills in phonological awareness, decoding, fluency, vocabulary,
comprehension, and writing to become independent, strategic readers and writers.

Question 43

Structured Literacy

Answer 43

“An approach to teaching students the structure of the English language
using direct and explicit instruction in a systematic and cumulative
manner, including diagnostic teaching of the essential components of
language and reading.”

Question 44

Syllable

Answer 44

A word or part of a word pronounced as a unit

Units of spoken language that consist of a vowel that may be preceded
and/or followed by several consonants.

Syllables are units of sound and can often be detected by paying attention to movements of the mouth.

Question 45

Syllable Types

Answer 45

There are six common types of syllables:
● closed
● VCe (long vowel-consonant-final e)
● open
● vowel team / vowel combination
● r-controlled
● consonant +le (final stable syllable)

Question 46

Syntax

Answer 46

Rules for a language consistently used to put words together in
grammatically-correct sentences.

Question 47

Systematic Instruction

Answer 47

Teaching a set of sound/spelling relationships in a clearly defined and purposefully selected logical instructional sequence that follows the logical order of language.

Question 48

Tiers of Instruction

Answer 48

Tier 1 – Universal. Student performance is at or above grade level,
requiring core instruction.

Tier 2 – Strategic. Student performance near (but still below) grade
level, requiring a moderate amount of intervention support.

Tier 3 – Intensive. Student performance that is well below grade
level and which indicates a need for a high level of intervention
support.

Question 49

Universal Screener

Answer 49

A short, easy-to-administer assessment used to identify students who may
be at risk for learning difficulties.

Question 50

Working Memory

Answer 50

The ability of a brain to hold and work with small amounts of information
while performing cognitive tasks, before the information is either
transferred to long-term memory or dismissed.