Nörogeribildirim ve çoklu duyulu öğrenme ile dislekside okuma becerilerinin artırılması

Developmental dyslexia is a subtype of specific learning disabilities. There are several methods for improving learning abilities, including neurofeedback and multi-sensory learning methods. As past work has shown, applying neurofeedback can improve spelling, reading, writing skills, normalizing fear, and anxiety of children with dyslexia. Multi-sensory learning methods utilize hearing (audition), reading (vision), seeing (vision), and touching (tactile/ kinaesthetic) simultaneously and proven to be useful for children with dyslexia. Neurofeedback focuses on normalizing the synaptic connections in the cortex, while multi-sensory learning focuses on using different parts of the brain to help with the learning process. In this research, the effectiveness of neurofeedback along with multi-sensory learning (MSL) experiences in helping dyslexia was investigated. Auto Train Brain is a neurofeedback and multi-sensory learning based mobile phone software application to improve the cognitive functions of children with dyslexia. It reads electroencephalography (EEG) signals from 14 channels of EMOTIV EPOC+ and processes these signals to provide neurofeedback to a child to improve the brain signals with visual and auditory cues in real-time. The major contribution of this thesis is that it presents the first study that combines neurofeedback with multi-sensory learning principles. Moreover Auto Train Brain has a novel neurofeedback technique from 14- electrode channels. Auto Train Brain was applied to 16 subjects with dyslexia (mean age: 8.56) 60 times for 30 minutes. 4 of them also received special education. The control group consisted of 14 subjects with dyslexia (mean age: 8.59) who did not have remedial teaching with Auto Train Brain, but who did continue special education. The TILLS test, which is a new neuropsychological test to diagnose dyslexia, was applied to both the experimental and the control groups at the beginning of the experiment and after a 6-month duration from the first TILLS test. Comparison of the pre- and post- TILLS test results indicate that applying neurofeedback and multi-sensory learning method concurrently is feasible for improving reading abilities of people with dyslexia. Reading comprehension of the experimental group improved more than that of the control group statistically significantly.