Changes in perceptual, motor and reading test scores in a remedial reading group.

Two matched groups each composed of nine children with reading problems were compared on a number of perceptual, motor, and reading tests. One group was thereafter exposed to a special remedial program. On retest this group showed significant gains in reading as well as in some of the perceptual and motor areas. No similar improvement was detected in the control group denied the remedial treatment. Not all perceptual tests showed a parallel improvement with reading and the implications of this finding are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

From reading to spelling and spelling to reading: Transfer goes both ways.

This study compares the effects of practice spelling and reading specific words on the orthographic representations in memory involved in reading both practiced words and new, unfamiliar words. Typically developing readers in Grade 2 (mean age = 7 years, 7 months) participated in a training study examining whether transfer can occur between reading and spelling following a series of reading and spelling practice sessions. Practice consisted of either repeated reading or repeated spelling of words with shared orthographic rime patterns. A series of mixed analyses of variance was used to examine generalization within skill and transfer across skill. Following practice, word-specific transfer across skill was found. Specifically, children were better able to spell words they had practiced reading and to read words they had practiced spelling. In addition, generalization to new words with practiced rime units was found both within a skill and across skills. However, transfer from spelling to reading was greater than transfer from reading to spelling. Results indicate that the orthographic representations established through practice can be used for both reading and spelling. Subsequently, reading and spelling curricula should be coordinated to benefit children maximally. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Code-oriented instruction for kindergarten students at risk for reading difficulties: A randomized field trial with paraeducator implementers.

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effectiveness of code-oriented supplemental instruction for kindergarten students at risk for reading difficulties. Paraeducators were trained to provide 18 weeks of explicit instruction in phonemic skills and the alphabetic code. Students identified by their teachers meeting study eligibility criteria were randomly assigned to 2 groups: individual supplemental instruction and control. Students were pretested in December, midtested, and posttested in May-June of kindergarten. At posttest, treatment students significantly outperformed controls on measures of reading accuracy, reading efficiency, oral reading fluency, and developmental spelling. Treatment students had significantly higher linear growth rates in phonemic awareness and alphabetic knowledge during the kindergarten treatment. At a 1-year follow-up, significant group differences remained in reading accuracy and efficiency. Ethical challenges of longitudinal intervention research are discussed. Findings have policy implications for making supplemental instruction in critical early reading skills available. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Contribution of spelling instruction to the spelling, writing, and reading of poor spellers.

The contribution of supplemental spelling instruction to spelling, writing, and reading was examined. Second-grade children experiencing difficulties learning to spell participated in 48 20-min sessions designed to improve their spelling skills. In comparison with peers in a contact control condition receiving mathematics instruction, students in the spelling condition made greater improvements on norm-referenced spelling measures, a writing-fluency test, and a reading word-attack measure following instruction. Six months later, students in the spelling treatment maintained their advantage in spelling but not on the writing-fluency and reading word-attack measures. However, spelling instruction had a positive effect at maintenance on the reading word-recognition skills of children who scored lowest on this measure at pretest. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Assessment and Early Instruction of Preschool Children at Risk for Reading Disability.

Preschool children at familial risk for reading disability were assessed on cognitive and linguistic variables and compared with preschoolers without familial risk. Risk children displayed performance profiles resembling those of older children with reading disability. Each group received intensive instruction in phonemic awareness and structured book reading. Instructed risk children made somewhat smaller gains than the nonrisk and required more teaching sessions to reach criterion. Rhyme and phoneme awareness predicted instruction outcome levels, and vocabulary and verbal short-term memory predicted number of teaching sessions to criterion. In kindergarten, the nonrisk group outperformed the risk group on reading and spelling, although the risk group reached grade-appropriate levels. At-risk children can be helped by appropriate preschool instruction, but they require more sustained teaching than nonrisk preschoolers. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Learning to read and spell in Persian: A cross-sectional study from Grades 1 to 4.

We investigated the reading and spelling development of 140 Persian children attending Grades 1–4 in Iran. Persian has very consistent letter–sound correspondences, but it varies in transparency because 3 of its 6 vowel phonemes are not marked with letters. Persian also varies in spelling consistency because 6 phonemes have more than one orthographic representation. We tested whether lexicality effects—an advantage of words over nonwords—would be affected be reading transparency and spelling consistency. We found that children became more efficient readers and spellers across grades, with the greatest growth occurring between Grades 1 and 2. For reading, lexicality effects were present with transparent words starting in Grade 2, but lexicality effects with opaque words were not yet present in Grade 4. As expected, the size of transparency effects for reading decreased across grades. For spelling, however, there was no lexicality effect for either consistent or inconsistent words. Moreover, consistency effects were large and did not decrease systematically across grades. Most interesting from a developmental perspective was the finding that both reading transparency and spelling polygraphy affected reading as well as spelling in Grades 1 and 2, but the word characteristics had differential effects as a function of literacy task in Grades 3 and 4. This pattern highlights the vulnerability of children's representations and processes during the early phases of acquisition as well as the rapidity with which representations and processes become specialized as a function of the literacy task at hand. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Speech perception, vocabulary, and the development of reading skills in english among Korean- and English-speaking children.

This study examined the roles of speech perception and phonological processing in reading and spelling acquisition for native and nonnative speakers of English in the 1st grade. The performance of 50 children (23 native English speakers and 27 native Korean speakers) was examined on tasks assessing reading and spelling, phonological processing, speech perception, and receptive vocabulary at the start and end of the school year. Korean-speaking children outperformed native English speakers on each of the literacy measures at the start and end of 1st grade, despite differences in their initial phonological representations and processing skills. Furthermore, speech perception and phonological processing were important contributors to early literacy skills, independent of oral language skills, for children from both language groups. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Development of word reading fluency and spelling in a consistent orthography: An 8-year follow-up.

In a longitudinal study, development of word reading fluency and spelling were followed for almost 8 years. In a group of 115 students (65 girls, 50 boys) acquiring the phonologically transparent German orthography, prediction measures (letter knowledge, phonological short-term memory, phonological awareness, rapid automatized naming, and nonverbal IQ) were assessed at the beginning of Grade 1; reading fluency and spelling were tested at the end of Grade 1 as well as in Grades 4 and 8. Reading accuracy was close to ceiling in all reading assessments, such that reading fluency was not heavily influenced by differences in reading accuracy. High stability was observed for word reading fluency development. Of the dysfluent readers in Grade 1, 70% were still poor readers in Grade 8. For spelling, children who at the end of Grade 1 still had problems translating spoken words into phonologically plausible letter sequences developed problems with orthographic spelling later on. The strongest specific predictors were rapid automatized naming for reading fluency and phonological awareness for spelling. Word recognition speed was a relevant and highly stable indicator of reading skills and the only indicator that discriminated reading skill levels in consistent orthographies. Its long-term development was more strongly influenced by early naming speed than by phonological awareness. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Teaching phonics in the context of children's literature or spelling: Influences on first-grade reading, spelling, and writing and fifth-grade comprehension.

First-grade children's reading, writing, and spelling competencies in 2 different instructional contexts for teaching phonics were examined. Reading, writing, and spelling abilities were measured at the beginning, middle, and end of 1st grade. Children were randomly assigned to 1 of 2 treatments designed to teach grapheme-phoneme correspondences, blending, and segmenting. In 1 treatment, children generated spellings for words, and in the other treatment, phonics instruction was embedded in literature. The spelling treatment was significantly better for spelling phonetically regular real and pseudowords, reading phonetically regular pseudowords, and written story length. It was also more beneficial for low-ability children's reading of connected text. There were no treatment effects on reading uncontrolled words in text. At the end of 5th grade, spelling-context children had significantly higher comprehension than did literature-context children. Discussion focuses on phonological processing while spelling and the effects of the instructional press of context-embedded and context-reduced instructional approaches in 1st grade. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Development of Individual Differences in Reading: Results From Longitudinal Studies in English and Finnish.

The authors examined individual differences in reading development in English and Finnish. English-speaking Canadian children were assessed once per year in Grades 1-5, and Finnish children were assessed twice per year in Grades 1-2. Results from latent growth curve and simplex analyses showed that initial status was generally negatively associated with subsequent growth and that, although stable, individual differences were more likely to significantly decrease than to increase across the measurement points. Growth mixture models identified multiple groups of children whose reading development followed distinct patterns. The results indicate that it is possible for educational systems to significantly reduce individual differences in basic reading skills during early reading development. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The effects of a voluntary summer reading intervention on reading activities and reading achievement.

The causal effects of a voluntary summer reading intervention on children's reading activities and reading achievement were assessed in a randomized experiment involving 331 children in Grades 1-5. Children were pretested in the spring on a standardized test of reading achievement (Stanford Achievement Test, 10th ed.), on the Elementary Reading Attitudes Survey, and on a reading preference survey. At the end of the school year, children were stratified by their grade level and classroom and were randomly assigned to receive 10 books matched to their reading levels and preferences during summer vacation or after the administration of posttests. Children in the treatment group received books through airmail in July and August. In September, children were readministered the reading test and completed a survey of their summer reading activities. Although the treatment group reported reading more books and participating in more literacy activities than did the control group, there was no significant difference in reading achievement. Recommendations for enhancing the effects of voluntary reading through teacher-directed instruction and for conducting a replication study are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Training the word recognition skills of reading disabled children: Treatment and transfer effects.

54 disabled readers were randomly assigned to 1 of 2 word recognition and spelling training programs or to a problem solving and study skills training program. One word-training program taught orthographically regular words by whole word methods alone; the other trained constituent grapheme–phoneme correspondences. The word-training groups made significant gains in word recognition accuracy and speed and in spelling. Significant transfer was observed on uninstructed spelling content but not on uninstructed reading vocabulary. In general, the word-training programs were equally effective for instructed content, but the whole-word group was superior on some transfer measures at posttest. Although the results demonstrate that dyslexic readers can be instructed successfully, the children did not profit differentially from letter-sound over whole-word training in the present context. We speculate that severely disabled readers may require either a more extended period of letter–sound instruction to reliably adopt an alphabetic decoding strategy or additional specific training in phonological awareness and subsyllabic segmentation. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

To read or not to read: A meta-analysis of print exposure from infancy to early adulthood.

This research synthesis examines whether the association between print exposure and components of reading grows stronger across development. We meta-analyzed 99 studies (N = 7,669) that focused on leisure time reading of (a) preschoolers and kindergartners, (b) children attending Grades 1–12, and (c) college and university students. For all measures in the outcome domains of reading comprehension and technical reading and spelling, moderate to strong correlations with print exposure were found. The outcomes support an upward spiral of causality: Children who are more proficient in comprehension and technical reading and spelling skills read more; because of more print exposure, their comprehension and technical reading and spelling skills improved more with each year of education. For example, in preschool and kindergarten print exposure explained 12% of the variance in oral language skills, in primary school 13%, in middle school 19%, in high school 30%, and in college and university 34%. Moderate associations of print exposure with academic achievement indicate that frequent readers are more successful students. Interestingly, poor readers also appear to benefit from independent leisure time reading. We conclude that shared book reading to preconventional readers may be part of a continuum of out-of-school reading experiences that facilitate children's language, reading, and spelling achievement throughout their development. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Longitudinal relationships of levels of language in writing and between writing and reading in grades 1 to 7.

Longitudinal structural equation modeling was used to evaluate longitudinal relationships across adjacent grade levels 1 to 7 for levels of language in writing (Model 1, subword letter writing, word spelling, and text composing) or writing and reading (Model 2, subword letter writing and word spelling and reading; Model 3, word spelling and reading and text composing and comprehending). Significant longitudinal relationships were observed within and across levels of language: spelling to spelling and spelling to composing (Grades 1 to 7), Models 1 and 3, and composing to spelling (Grades 3 to 6, Model 1; Grades 4 to 6, Model 3); spelling to word reading and word reading to spelling (Grades 2 to 7), Models 2 and 3; spelling to word reading (Grade 1), Model 2, and word reading to spelling (Grade 1), Model 3; composition to comprehension (Grades 3 to 5), Model 3; comprehension to composition (Grades 2 to 6), Model 3; and comprehension to word reading (Grades 1 to 6), Model 3. Results are discussed in reference to the levels of language in translating ideas into written language and integrating writing and reading. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

An effective method for building meaning vocabulary in primary grades.

Teaching vocabulary to primary grade children is essential. Previous studies of teaching vocabulary (word meanings) using story books in the primary grades reported gains of 20%-25% of word meanings taught. The present studies concern possible influences on word meaning acquisition during instruction (Study 1) and increasing the percentage and number of word meanings acquired (Study 2). Both studies were conducted in a working-class school with approximately 50% English-language learners. The regular classroom teachers worked with their whole classes in these studies. In Study 1, average gains of 12% of word meanings were obtained using repeated reading. Adding word explanations added a 10% gain for a total gain of 22%. Pretesting had no effect on gains. In Study 2, results showed learning of 41% of word meanings taught. At this rate of learning word meanings taught, it would be possible for children to learn 400 word meanings a year if 1,000 word meanings were taught. The feasibility of teaching vocabulary to primary grade children is discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Predictors of reading and spelling abilities in first- and second-language learners.

This study examined the basic literacy skills and related processes of 1st- through 4th-grade children speaking English as a 1st language (L1) and English as a 2nd language (ESL). The performances of the L1 and ESL children on phonological awareness, word and pseudoword reading, and word and pseudoword spelling tasks were highly similar. The ESL children were at an advantage with regard to lexical access but performed more poorly on verbal working memory and syntactic awareness tasks. The results suggest that the main processes underlying L1 children's basic reading ability in Grades 1 and 2, namely phonological awareness and lexical access, are of equal importance for ESL children. Phonological awareness remained the strongest predictor of word reading ability for L1 and ESL children in Grades 3 and 4. However, the processes involved in L1 and ESL word reading and spelling appeared to vary at other points. Verbal working memory and syntactic awareness were found to be of importance for the word reading and spelling abilities of L1 children but not for ESL children. Lexical access was found to be of more importance for ESL children. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The role of instruction in learning to read: Preventing reading failure in at-risk children.

First and 2nd graders (N?=?285) receiving Title 1 services received 1 of 3 kinds of classroom reading programs: direct instruction in letter–sound correspondences practiced in decodable text (direct code); less direct instruction in systematic sound–spelling patterns embedded in connected text (embedded code); and implicit instruction in the alphabetic code while reading connected text (implicit code). Children receiving direct code instruction improved in word reading at a faster rate and had higher word-recognition skills than those receiving implicit code instruction. Effects of instructional group on word recognition were moderated by initial levels of phonological processing and were most apparent in children with poorer initial phonological processing skills. Group differences in reading comprehension paralleled those for word recognition but were less robust. Groups did not differ in spelling achievement or in vocabulary growth. Results show advantages for reading instructional programs that emphasize explicit instruction in the alphabetic principle for at-risk children. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Dysfluent reading in the absence of spelling difficulties: A specific disability in regular orthographies.

Two large studies identified substantial numbers of German-speaking children (Grade 3) with marked dissociations between reading and spelling difficulties. These dissociations were expected because German exhibits high regularity in the direction of graphemes to phonemes (forward regularity) but not in the direction of phonemes to graphemes (backward regularity). High forward regularity allows reliance on phonological processing in reading (even in advanced fluent reading), whereas low backward regularity requires reliance on orthographic memory representations in spelling. Dysfluent reading in the absence of spelling difficulties was associated only with a naming speed deficit--assessed at school entrance--but not with phonological memory or phonological awareness deficits. In contrast, a specific spelling deficit was preceded by phonological deficits. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The effects of an adapted interactive writing intervention on kindergarten children's phonological awareness, spelling, and early reading development: A contextualized approach to instruction.

Using a pretest-posttest comparison-group design, this 16-week study investigated the effects of 2 instructional approaches on the phonological awareness, alphabetic knowledge, and early reading of kindergarten children. The primary goal was to compare a form of contextualized instruction based on an adapted interactive writing program with a field-tested program of metalinguistic games. For instructional purposes, the children in each treatment group were divided into small intervention classes, with groupings based on children's common strengths and needs. Each week, these classes met with trained literacy tutors for 4 20-min lessons. Pretest and posttest measures provided data on children's phonological awareness, spelling, and reading development. Statistical analyses of the data indicated no between-groups differences with regard to phonological awareness and spelling achievement. In contrast, results revealed statistically significant differences between the 2 groups on word identification, passage comprehension, and word reading development measures, with the adapted interactive writing group demonstrating greater achievement. These findings verify that the children participating in a contextualized program matched or exceeded the achievement of the children participating in a structured program of metalinguistic games. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The Development of Reading in Children Who Speak English as a Second Language.

Patterns of reading development were examined in native English-speaking (L1) children and children who spoke English as a second language (ESL). Participants were 978 (790 L1 speakers and 188 ESL speakers) Grade 2 children involved in a longitudinal study that began in kindergarten. In kindergarten and Grade 2, participants completed standardized and experimental measures including reading, spelling, phonological processing, and memory. All children received phonological awareness instruction in kindergarten and phonics instruction in Grade 1. By the end of Grade 2, the ESL speakers' reading skills were comparable to those of L1 speakers, and ESL speakers even outperformed L1 speakers on several measures. The findings demonstrate that a model of early identification and intervention for children at risk is beneficial for ESL speakers and also suggest that the effects of bilingualism on the acquisition of early reading skills are not negative and may be positive. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)