Emotional growth and reading growth

Abstract

One of the basic Orton concepts, which I am sure has helped all of us, is the relatedness of the various phases of language in the develop ment of the child. We have learned that we cannot train his reading skills in isolation; we must consider all of his various language capacities: his understanding of the spoken word, his ability to express himself in speech, his verbal concepts both concrete and abstract, and his writing techniques at the same time. The Orton-trained "language therapist" dif fers from many so-called "reading specialists" or "speech correctionists" through this broader understanding of the language function as a whole. I am not sure, however, that our language therapists are always as much aware of the intimate relationship existing between the child's language development and his personality growth, and here perhaps the clinical psychologist may venture to offer some observations, both from theory and from his own practical experience in therapy with children with severe reading disabilities. For the past twenty-five years our educational emphasis has been steeped in Gestalt Psychology. This nice, round concept has been a fairly easy one and suggests that movement of anything in one direction will bring about necessary movements on other aspects—much like the rip ples of a lake. More recently the theory of homeostasis has been applied to the personality: that the personality has a tendency toward uniformity or stability. This concept is certainly akin to the current vogue in "self" psychology in that an individual unconsciously enhances and/or defends the self in the process of adjusting to the demands of his external as well as internal environment. It would seem, therefor*, a rather stark presumption to hypothesize that bonafide reading growth would be pos sible without emotional growth or that progress in any area of successful endeavor might not be reflected in the tendency toward a more harmon ious total personality structure. I do not question that you also have seen this, and would agree that the development of a more stable personality is a concomitant reward for the tedious hours of "A says (a), and T says (t)." For you to help a fourth grade child to advance from a first grade reader to a fourth grade reader is of tremendous importance in the fourth grade, but to grow from feeling like a first grader to feeling like a fourth grader is probably even more important to the fourth grader. I am sure you have witnessed this type of phenomenon even though your therapeutic emphasis might have been concentrated in the area of remedial reading therapy. We are