scholarly journals Relationships of French and English Morphophonemic Orthographies to Word Reading, Spelling, and Reading Comprehension During Early and Middle Childhood

2016 ◽  
Vol 31 (4) ◽  
pp. 305-321 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert D. Abbott ◽  
Michel Fayol ◽  
Michel Zorman ◽  
Séverine Casalis ◽  
William Nagy ◽  
...  

Two longitudinal studies of word reading, spelling, and reading comprehension identified commonalities and differences in morphophonemic orthographies—French (Study 1, n = 1,313) or English (Study 2, n = 114) in early childhood (Grade 2)and middle childhood (Grade 5). For French and English, statistically significant concurrent relationships among these literacy skills occurred in Grades 2 and 5, and longitudinal relationships for each skill with itself from Grades 2 to 5; but concurrent relationships were more sizable and longitudinal relationships more variable for English than French especially for word reading to reading comprehension. Results show that, for both morphophonemic orthographies, assessment and instructional practices should be tailored to early or middle childhood, and early childhood reading comprehension may not be related to middle childhood spelling. Also discussed are findings applying only to English, for which word origin is primarily Anglo-Saxon in early childhood, but increasingly French in middle childhood.

2019 ◽  
Vol 55 (1) ◽  
pp. 23-31
Author(s):  
Kelly J. Williams ◽  
Leticia R. Martinez

Many adolescent students who are learning English and are identified with learning disabilities have difficulties with both reading comprehension and English language proficiency. In the secondary grades, these students have fewer opportunities to improve their reading comprehension and to learn from a range of disciplinary texts. To address these challenges, this article provides research-based practices to improve the language and literacy skills of these students through explicit instruction on word reading and academic vocabulary.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kyle Levesque ◽  
Helen Breadmore ◽  
Helene Deacon

A defining feature of language lies in its capacity to represent meaning across oral and written forms. Morphemes, the smallest units of meaning in a language, are the fundamental building blocks that encode meaning, and morphological skills enable their effective use in oral and written language. Increasing evidence indicates that morphological skills are linked to literacy outcomes, including word reading, spelling, and reading comprehension. Despite this evidence, the precise ways in which morphology influences the development of children’s literacy skills remains largely underspecified in theoretical models of reading and spelling development. In this paper, we draw on the extensive empirical evidence base in English to explicitly detail how morphology might be integrated into models of reading and spelling development. In doing so, we build on the perspective that morphology is multidimensional in its support of literacy development. The culmination of our efforts is the Morphological Pathways Framework—an adapted framework that illuminates precise mechanisms by which morphology impacts word reading, spelling, and reading comprehension. Through this framework, we bring greater clarity and specificity on how the use of morphemes in oral and written language supports the development of children’s literacy skills. We also highlight gaps in the literature, revealing important areas to focus future research to improve theoretical understanding. Furthermore, this paper provides valuable theoretical insight that will guide future empirical inquiries in identifying more precise morphological targets for intervention, which may have widespread implications for informing literacy practices in the classroom and educational policies more broadly.


2020 ◽  
Vol 51 (3) ◽  
pp. 603-616
Author(s):  
Kenn Apel ◽  
Victoria S. Henbest

Purpose Morphological awareness is the ability to consciously manipulate the smallest units of meaning in language. Morphological awareness contributes to success with literacy skills for children with typical language and those with language impairment. However, little research has focused on the morphological awareness skills of children with speech sound disorders (SSD), who may be at risk for literacy impairments. No researcher has examined the morphological awareness skills of children with SSD and compared their skills to children with typical speech using tasks representing a comprehensive definition of morphological awareness, which was the main purpose of this study. Method Thirty second- and third-grade students with SSD and 30 with typical speech skills, matched on age and receptive vocabulary, completed four morphological awareness tasks and measures of receptive vocabulary, real-word reading, pseudoword reading, and word-level spelling. Results Results indicated there was no difference between the morphological awareness skills of students with and without SSD. Although morphological awareness was moderately to strongly related to the students' literacy skills, performance on the morphological awareness tasks contributed little to no additional variance to the children's real-word reading and spelling skills beyond what was accounted for by pseudoword reading. Conclusions Findings suggest that early elementary-age students with SSD may not present with concomitant morphological awareness difficulties and that the morphological awareness skills of these students may not play a unique role in their word-level literacy skills. Limitations and suggestions for future research on the morphological awareness skills of children with SSD are discussed.


2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (7) ◽  
pp. 828
Author(s):  
Maja Roch ◽  
Kate Cain ◽  
Christopher Jarrold

Reading for meaning is one of the most important activities in school and everyday life. The simple view of reading (SVR) has been used as a framework for studies of reading comprehension in individuals with Down syndrome (DS). These tend to show difficulties in reading comprehension despite better developed reading accuracy. Reading comprehension difficulties are influenced by poor oral language. These difficulties are common in individuals with DS and autism spectrum disorder (ASD), but they have never been compared directly. Moreover, the components of reading for comprehension have rarely been investigated in these populations: a better understanding of the nature of reading comprehension difficulties may inform both theory and practice. The aim of this study was to determine whether reading comprehension in the two populations is accounted for by the same component skills and to what extent the reading profile of the two atypical groups differs from that of typically developing children (TD). Fifteen individuals with DS (mean age = 22 years 4 months, SD = 5 years 2 months), 21 with ASD (mean age = 13 years 2 months, SD = 1 year 6 months), and 42 TD children (mean age = 8 years 1 month, SD = 7 months) participated and were assessed on measures of receptive vocabulary, text reading and listening comprehension, oral language comprehension, and reading accuracy. The results showed similar levels in word reading accuracy and in receptive vocabulary in all three groups. By contrast, individuals with DS and ASD showed poorer non-word reading and reading accuracy in context than TD children. Both atypical groups showed poorer listening and reading text comprehension compared to TD children. Reading for comprehension, investigated through a homograph reading accuracy task, showed a different pattern for individuals with DS with respect to the other two groups: they were less sensitive to meaning while reading. According to the SVR, the current results confirm that the two atypical groups have similar profiles that overlap with that of poor comprehenders in which poor oral language comprehension constrains reading for comprehension.


2021 ◽  
pp. 073194872198997
Author(s):  
Philip Capin ◽  
Eunsoo Cho ◽  
Jeremy Miciak ◽  
Greg Roberts ◽  
Sharon Vaughn

This study investigated the word reading and listening comprehension difficulties of fourth-grade students with significant reading comprehension deficits and the cognitive difficulties that underlie these weaknesses. Latent profile analysis was used to classify a sample of fourth-grade students ( n = 446) who scored below the 16th percentile on a measure of reading comprehension into subgroups based on their performance in word reading (WR) and listening comprehension (LC). Three latent profiles emerged: (a) moderate deficits in both WR and LC of similar severity (91%), (b) severe deficit in WR paired with moderate LC deficit (5%), and (c) severe deficit in LC with moderate WR difficulties (4%). Analyses examining the associations between cognitive attributes and group membership indicated students with lower performance on cognitive predictors were more likely to be in a severe subgroup. Implications for educators targeting improved reading performance for upper elementary students with significant reading difficulties were discussed.


2021 ◽  
pp. 004005992110101
Author(s):  
Nicole S. Fenty ◽  
Abby Pierce ◽  
Julia Schildwachter

There has been an increased emphasis in recent years on supporting young children with building 21st century literacy skills such as critical thinking and collaboration. Unfortunately, young children with or at risk for disabilities are unlikely to receive access to experiences that build 21st century literacies. Pre-coding activities, which include hands-on coding games and stories appropriate for young children, are one way to provide access to this population of students. The purpose of this article is to provide details about how educators in early childhood inclusive settings may integrate pre-coding activities with everyday routines and procedures as well as with common grade level appropriate read alouds. Fundamentals of pre-coding are provided along with guidelines for planning and instruction.


2014 ◽  
Vol 36 (6) ◽  
pp. 1375-1391 ◽  
Author(s):  
KATHLEEN HIPFNER-BOUCHER ◽  
KATIE LAM ◽  
XI CHEN

ABSTRACTThis study investigated the relationship between L2 oral narrative morphosyntactic quality and L2 reading comprehension in a sample of 81 students enrolled in a Canadian French immersion program in Grade 1. Measures of French narrative generation and reading comprehension were administered concurrently. The proportion of utterances in the narratives that were judged to be grammatically acceptable was found to explain unique variance in reading comprehension, controlling for nonverbal intelligence, maternal education, phonological awareness, vocabulary and word reading. The results suggest that even in the earliest stages of L2 literacy acquisition, L2 oral language skills contribute to reading comprehension outcomes. The results of our study suggest that there may be value in providing L2 children with classroom-based story-related experiences that expose them to literate language.


2021 ◽  
pp. 004005992110255
Author(s):  
Whitney Sommers Butler ◽  
Casey Hord ◽  
Susan Watts-Taffe

In spite of the prevailing assumption that formal reading instruction is no longer needed once adolescents reach high school, students at the secondary level still benefit from explicit reading instruction to continue developing advanced literacy skills enabling them to access complex narrative texts. This article argues for the importance of teachers to scrutinize the texts they plan to teach to determine what instruction and supports are needed to promote reading comprehension for students with learning disabilities. Specifically, this article examines how nonlinear text structures can challenge adolescent reading comprehension and illustrates explicit text structure instruction with three exemplar texts which use unconventional narrative patterns. The article emphasizes the importance of considering the qualitative features of texts to inform instruction to support reading comprehension for students with learning disabilities.


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