FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

Cellfield is suitable for students (age 6 and over) with reading difficulties.

 Selection criteria includes:  
• reading age falls behind actual age.
• symptoms of dyslexia. • language disorders.
• difficulty carrying out oral instructions.
• poor reading, spelling and writing skills.
• poor fluency, accuracy and/or comprehension.
• cannot recall what they have read.
• feel discomfort or suffer from fatigue when reading.
• have poor working memory.
• feel discomfort looking at black letters on white paper.
• eye movement control problems.  

Children between the ages of 6 and 8 years need to have some basic phonemic awareness and word recognition skills to be able to commence the Cellfield Program.

Research in the area of Brain plasticity is now suggesting that our brain pathways can be changed! The Cellfield reading intervention program specifically aims to re-route these pathways. Cellfield specifically targets the auditory, visual, and auditory-to-visual pathways within the brain.

Brain plasticity (also called neuroplasticity) is a common term used by neuroscientists. It refers to the brain’s ability to change at any age.

Cellfield is a 16-week program which includes:  

• Week 1 – Pre Cellfield Assessments
• Week 2 and 3 – 10 x 1 hour computer sessions at the clinic
• Week 4 – Post Assessment, 10 days after computer sessions
• Weeks 5 to 15 – 10 weekly 30 to 45 minute follow-up sessions
• Week 16 – Final 2nd Post Assessments

We use Industry standard tests (e.g: GORT and Woodcock) BEFORE and AFTER Cellfield to measure student outcomes.

Cellfield achieves consistent gains in the several key test areas. The best result is Word Attack which often shows age improvement of two years. Work Attack is the ability to read aloud nonsense words (e.g., plurp, fronkett) to test phonetic “word attack” skills. Passage Comprehension and Word Comprehension skills also improve on average 17 to 18 months.

Here are some statistics:

# Students             Tested for                         Average Gain *    
    1133                 Word Attack                     + 26.19 months    
    1114        Passage Comprehension          + 18.55 months    
      108           Word Comprehension            + 17.68 months

* Gains calculated 26/07/2016 on Student test result data as entered by authorised Cellfield Licensees.

Clients have reported they noticed better focus in school and with homework, greater motivation, better organization during task completion, improved confidence, and improved self-esteem. Sub-groups of children with Specific Language Impairments have also achieved improved literacy skills. Cellfield is also exploring the benefits of working with autistic clients. An autistic child with ADHD, well known and supported by this Speech Language Pathologist, completed the Cellfield program at age 8. By Cellfield standards, core skill gains were moderate, however his comprehension improved by one year, and his reading rate improved by four months, in just a few weeks. Qualified and experienced Cellfield providers have observed other improvements as well. The autistic child mentioned above sat down for his first session with severe attention difficulties, in a state of frustration, with low endurance, fatigue issues, and with ingrained avoidance strategies. Through Cellfield, he became more willing to read, experienced less frustration, and furthermore, Cellfield became a powerful tool with which to make progress with his receptive language skills.

The Cellfield treatment requires that a subject to concentrate and apply ‘sufficient’ cognitive effort during the treatment sessions. It is not unusual to have subjects who are poor in these respects. Skillful and persistent attention by Cellfield practitioners have succeeded in most very difficult cases.
 
But there are extreme cases where subjects just cannot apply that cognitive effort or attention, either through injury, impaired vision, hearing or motor functions, or severe psychological problems. These subjects are less likely to derive benefit from the Cellfield dyslexia program.

Subjects also need to have some basic knowledge and skills, such as have reasonable letter/sound correspondence skills in place. If this is not the case, then subjects should undertake some conventional tuition before undertaking Cellfield.

Those with epileptic tendencies require written medical clearance before undergo the Cellfield treatment.

There are several research studies that suggest Cellfield will improve reading difficulties including dyslexia:

•  A peer-reviewed study, published in the Australian Journal of Learning Disabilities 2005, showed that Cellfield achieved key skill learning rates up to 40 times faster than a normal child. This is unprecedented.

•  In 2009 Professor Coltheart from the Macquarie Centre for Cognitive Science, supported the position that Cellfield outcome gains, were not augmented by test/retest effects, (given the two-week time interval between the before and after assessments), or by regressions towards the mean, (a statistical tendency for very low scores to improve the second time without any intervention). Coltheart’s closing comments: “There is clear statistical evidence that the Cellfield treatment improved these children’s ability to read”.

•  In 2009, a study of Cellfield’s efficacy was performed at the University of Tasmania. Twelve children, all screened as being dyslexic (according to the Dyslexia Screening Test (DST) by Fawcett and Nicholson) participated. The research team recorded neural activity during reading, using Event Related Potentials (ERP) methods. Before Cellfield, none of the children showed the left hemisphere activity typical of reading. Seven children performed the Cellfield dyslexia treatment and five in the placebo group played a computer game. Both groups then had three weeks of regular schooling. The Cellfield group showed a 33% drop in their DST dyslexic risk index compared to the placebo group which dropped by only 10%. ERP results indicated neural changes only within the Cellfield group, which shifted activity from the right hemisphere to the left hemisphere “suggesting, at least neurally, a partial return to language processing which more closely resembles that of normal readers”.

Yes. If the pre-assessment has indicated very severe reading disabilities or if the student has not reached their age level in all their reading skills after completion of the program. Your provider may recommend that Cellfield be repeated at a higher level, 6 to 12 months later.

CONTACT US or refer to our LOCATIONS page to find your nearest Cellfield provider...

Yes. We are currently seeking qualified individuals and centres to become Cellfield providers.

Ideal providers are speech-language therapists, occupational therapists, educators including special education teachers, psychologists, audiologists, learning/tutoring centres and quality educational institutions.

CONTACT US if you would like to join our mission of providing struggling readers with the ability to learn to read. . .