If you give girls and boys language tasks, most girls will process the information in the same way (in a specialized language area)
help them with word storage and retrieval
But for boys, sensitivity to the modality of how words are presented means that an extra steps need to be taken to match words that are picked up by listening and words that are read on the printed page. No wonder dyslexia is much more common in boys - the separate system means that the sight and sound of words are learned as distinct processes.
As a result, verbal competence may be strong in one domain (oral speech for instance), but be weak in another (reading).
because boys require two areas and a matching of visual-auditory inputs, impairment in one system may cause the whole language coordination process to fail.
The visual-auditory gap may also be why some boys may need to read word-for-word outloud or to themselves (i.e. not silently read) in order to fully comprehend or remember the story.
Some careful consideration needs to made of instructional implications for boys given some of these new discoveries. Learning by listening and learning by reading are not synonymous; route-congruent factors(listening - oral presentation, reading - written response) may need to be considered when a learning gap or frank underachievement is seen, and an insistence on the availability of auditory-visual supports (reading along with books-on-tape, detailed handouts for lecture courses) should be a requirement of every classroom.
