Examining the Relationship Between Emergent Literacy Skills and Invented Spelling in Prekindergarten Spanish-Speaking Dual Language Learners

The purpose of the present study was to examine associations among English and Spanish emergent literacy skills of prekindergarten (pre-K) Spanish-speaking dual language learners in relation to their English invented spelling. Study participants included 141 Spanish-speaking 4-year-old children enrolled in state-funded pre-K programs in a large urban city located in the Southeast. All children were receiving English-only instruction. Children’s Spanish and English receptive vocabulary and code-related skills were assessed in the fall and spring of their pre-K year, but their invented spelling was assessed only in the spring. Research Findings: Analyses revealed significant correlations among children’s English and Spanish receptive vocabulary as well as English and Spanish early code-related skills in the fall and spring of the school year. Hierarchical regression analyses revealed direct contributions of children’s English vocabulary and growth in Spanish code-related skills across the year to children’s English invented spelling in the spring of the school year. This analysis also revealed that associations between children’s English code-related skills and invented spelling appear to work through Spanish code-related skills. Practice or Policy: In order to promote young dual language learners’ English invented spelling skills, early childhood educators should seek to support children’s English vocabulary and English and Spanish code-related emergent literacy skills.     

Cognitive and Linguistic Precursors to Early Literacy Achievement in Children With Specific Language Impairment

This study investigated the role of cognitive and language skills as predictors of early literacy skills in children with Specific Language Impairment. A range of cognitive and linguistic skills were assessed in a sample of 137 eight-year-old children with SLI at the beginning of the school year, and 6 months later on word decoding and reading comprehension. The cognitive and linguistic measures revealed four factors that were called language, speech, short-term memory, and phonological awareness. Structural equation modeling showed word decoding to be predicted by speech, short-term memory, and phonological awareness, whereas reading comprehension was predicted by word decoding skills and short-term memory. It can be concluded that in children with SLI variations in early word decoding are mostly determined by speech abilities and short-term memory, and to a lesser extent by phonological awareness. Moreover, reading comprehension turns out to be highly dependent on word decoding and short-term memory.     

Relations Between Children's Invented Spelling and the Development of Phonological Awareness

The objective of this study was to assess the impact on phonological skills of a training program that was intended to lead preschool children to move from prephonetic spellings to early phonemic spellings. The participants were 30 preschool children who were divided into two groups (experimental and control groups) that were equivalent in terms of the children's intelligence, the number of letters with which they were familiar and the nature of their invented spelling. The intervention proved effective, inasmuch as the children in the experimental group moved to early phonemic spellings, whereas those in the control group did not. This conceptual evolution entailed enhanced performance in phonemic classification, segmentation and deletion tests, in which the children in the experimental group displayed a degree of progress which differed significantly from that achieved by the members of the control group.     

The Unique Role of Early Spelling in the Prediction of Later Literacy Performance

ABSTRACT

We examined the predictive value of early spelling for later reading performance by analyzing data from 970 U.S. children whose spelling was assessed in the summer following the completion of kindergarten (M age = 6 years; 3 months). The word reading performance of most of the children was then tested after the completion of Grade 1 (age 7;5), Grade 2 (8;5), Grade 4 (10;5), and Grade 9 (15;5). A computer-scored measure of postkindergarten spelling was a significant predictor of later reading performance even after taking into account postkindergarten phonological awareness, reading, and letter-sound knowledge and prekindergarten vocabulary. The results suggest that, by the end of kindergarten, spelling is more than just a proxy for phonological awareness and letter-sound knowledge. Given the information that spelling provides, it should be considered for inclusion when screening children for future literacy problems.     

Morphological Awareness,Orthographic Knowledge,and Spelling Errors: Keys to Understanding Early Chinese Literacy Acquisition

This 1-year longitudinal study examined the extent to which morphological awareness, orthographic knowledge, and phonological awareness, along with speeded naming, uniquely explained word recognition, dictation (i.e., spelling), and reading comprehension among 171 young Hong Kong Chinese children. With age and vocabulary knowledge statistically controlled, both morphological awareness and orthographic knowledge were uniquely associated with all three concurrently measured literacy skills, as well as longitudinal measures of specific literacy skills. Naming speed was also uniquely associated with concurrent word reading, as well as all three literacy skills longitudinally, even with their autoregressive effects controlled. Analyses of children's spelling mistakes indicated that 97% and 95% of all errors were either morpholexically or orthographically based at times 1 and 2, respectively. Morphologically based spelling errors were also uniquely associated with all three literacy skills across time. Findings underscore the importance of morphological awareness and orthographic knowledge for Chinese literacy acquisition.     

Early Literacy Measures for Improving Student Reading Achievement: Translating Research Into Practice

The importance of early literacy instruction and its role in later reading proficiency is well established; however, measures and procedures to screen and monitor proficiency in the area of early literacy are less well researched. The purpose of this study was to (a) examine the technical adequacy and validity of early curriculum-based literacy measures, Letter–Sound Correspondence, Onset Phoneme Identification, and Phoneme Segmentation, developed for use within the problem-solving model in the Minneapolis Public Schools and (b) describe the district-wide implementation of these measures. In general, these measures were found to have adequate reliability and validity, have moderate to moderately high correlations with criterion measures (oral reading, report cards), and be sensitive to growth across the school year. A case study of how these measures are used for screening and progress monitoring to improve reading achievement within 1 school is included. Limitations and future directions are also presented.     

Spelling in Children With Dyslexia: Analyses From the Treiman-Bourassa Early Spelling Test

We examined the oral and written spelling performance on the Treiman-Bourassa Early Spelling Test (Treiman & Bourassa, 2000a) of 30 children with serious reading and spelling problems and 30 spelling-level-matched younger children who were progressing normally in learning to read and spell. The 2 groups' spellings were equivalent on a composite measure of phonological and orthographic sophistication, representation of the phonological skeleton of the items, and orthographic legality. The groups showed a similar advantage for words over nonwords on the phonological skeleton and orthographic legality measures. The children with dyslexia and the comparison children also showed an equivalent advantage for written over oral spelling on the composite and phonological skeleton measures. Further analyses revealed that children with dyslexia made many of the same linguistically based errors as typically developing children but also pointed to some subtle differences between the groups. Overall, the spelling performance of children with dyslexia appears to be quite similar to that of normally progressing younger children.     

Metalinguistic Awareness,Reading and Spelling: Roots and Branches of Literacy

Studies on the role of metalinguistic awareness in emerging literacy have established that metalinguistic abilities at phonological, syntactic, print and pragmatic levels are linked to later attainments in literacy. Few have examined the interplay among these skills and developing reading and spelling. Using time-reversed path analyses, this study explores the possibility that metalinguistic awareness registers stronger direct effects on literacy than early pre-conventional reading and invented spelling skills. Sixty children aged 54 months (initially) were given measures of metalinguistic abilities, pre-conventional reading and invented spelling on three occasions. This allowed the exploration of reciprocal relationships between pre-conventional reading, invented spelling and metalinguistic abilities. On the fourth occasion, standardised tests of reading and spelling were administered. Results from time-reversed path analysis show that pre-conventional reading and invented spelling influenced each other across development and had stronger direct effects on subsequent literacy than did aspects of metalinguistic awareness. Pre-literate metalinguistic abilities were shown to affect pre-conventional reading and invented spelling skills and combine with these to influence further growth in literacy. The study’s results have implications for current models of literacy development.     

First-Grade Spelling Scores Within the Dynamic Indicators of Basic Early Literacy Skills (DIBELS) Screening: An Exploratory Study

The purpose of this study was to examine the validity evidence of first-grade spelling scores from a standardized test of nonsense word spellings and their potential value within universal literacy screening. Spelling scores from the Test of Phonological Awareness: Second Edition PLUS for 47 first-grade children were scored using a standardized procedure and an alternative invented spelling procedure. Correlations were examined among spelling and diagnostic word reading and decoding scores, along with scores from the Dynamic Indicators of Basic Early Literacy Skills (DIBELS). Spelling scores were significantly correlated with word reading and decoding scores, as well as DIBELS scores, except Phoneme Segmentation Fluency. Hierarchical multiple regression analyses revealed that spelling scores reliably accounted for significant variance in decoding but not word reading scores, beyond DIBELS scores. Implications are discussed related to the potential value of including early spelling scores within universal literacy screening.     

Name Writing: A Window into the Emergent Literacy Skills of Young Children

This article discusses the potential significance of name writing skills in addressing many important questions about the development of early literacy skills. Young children are inherently interested in producing their own names in print. Furthermore, young children appear to construct their understandings of name writing skills in a predictable, sequential pattern. Questions raised include whether the development of name writing skills mirrors the development of other important cognitive skills, the potential of name writing skills to offer insight as to how young children learn important literacy concepts, the use of name writing as a developmental indicator for children that may be at risk for reading difficulties, and the potential for structured activities using name writing to facilitate the development of emergent literacy skills.     

The Moving Window Technique: A Window Into Developmental Changes in Attention During Facial Emotion Recognition

The strategies children employ to selectively attend to different parts of the face may reflect important developmental changes in facial emotion recognition. Using the Moving Window Technique (MWT), children aged 5–12 years and adults (N = 129) explored faces with a mouse‐controlled window in an emotion recognition task. An age‐related increase in attention to the left eye emerged at age 11–12 years and reached significance in adulthood. This left‐eye bias is consistent with previous eye tracking research and findings of a perceptual bias for the left side of faces. These results suggest that a strategic attentional bias to the left eye begins to emerge at age 11–12 years and is likely established sometime in adolescence.     

力量的抗争——《共产党宣言》的认知语言学解读

《共产党宣言》作为一部伟大的经典名著,对阶级阶层分析是其精髓和亮点.以往对《共产党宣言》中阶级和阶层的研究往往停留在政治和哲学层面,鲜见从认知层面进行研究.从认知语言学的角度探讨《共产党宣言》中关于阶级和阶层的论述,借用力量-动态图式解读《共产党宣言》中所提到的不同阶级和阶层的力量对抗无疑是一种新的尝试.     

从认知的角度看语言符号的任意性

以索绪尔为代表的一部分语言学家将任意性视为语言的基本特征之一,他们认为语言符号的能指与所指之间的关系是任意的、无理据的。以词为例,利用认知理论分析论证语音与语义之间、词与思维之间存在的必然联系,从而说明语言符号的任意性是相对的。     

内隐认知:认识人类认知与学习的新窗口

内隐认知是人类认知系统的重要组成部分.对内隐认知的发现和研究打破了仅仅重视外显认知的单一局面,为更加全面、深入地认识人类认知系统的多重性和认知过程及其发展的内在规律提供了新的角度.当前的内隐认知研究广泛涉及了感知、记忆、语言理解、规则抽取、动作技能、情感反应等多个方面,揭示出内隐认知的多样性和复杂性.已有研究指出,内隐认知在种系发展和个体发展中均具有独特的重要地位.充分利用内隐认知将有助于促进认知效率的提高以及认知发展,并可为外显认知功能受损个体的功能康复带来希望.进一步揭示内隐认知与外显认知的相互联系与促进问题,对于揭示人类认知本质及促进人类认知发展与认知功能康复具有重要意义.     

Contributions of the Home Literacy Environment and Underlying Language Skills to Preschool Invented Writing

This study aimed to enhance our knowledge of the constituent variables affecting invented writing skills in 5-year-olds by investigating the concurrent relationships among home literacy, underlying language skills, and invented writing. The study comprised 111 Norwegian-speaking children (mean age: 5.7 years; 58 girls) and their parents. The children’s language skills were tested individually. The results showed that, on average, children achieved low scores on tests of word writing; however, the within-group variations in the children’s invented writing performances were large. The statistical modeling showed that parental education was significantly related to the home literacy environment, which was, in turn, directly related to both vocabulary and phonological awareness and indirectly related to invented writing skills. Implications of the findings are discussed.     

Exploring the Space Between Good and Poor Spelling: Orthographic Quality and Reading Speed

ABSTRACT

Variations in the accuracy and stability of a word’s spelling can be used to gauge the quality of its underlying orthographic representation. The Lexical Quality Hypothesis (LQH) contends that words with higher quality cognitive representations should be accessed more efficiently than those with lower quality representations. If this is the case, deviations in spelling accuracy and stability should be reflected in differences in reading times. Here, 90 teenage participants read 30 words; reading times were recorded. After a 2-week delay, the students spelled these same words 3 times each to gain a measure of orthographic quality. In line with the LQH, faster reading speeds were observed for words with higher spelling accuracy and stability, even for words that were not always spelled perfectly. To our knowledge, our findings provide the first empirical support for the notion that orthographic quality exists along a continuum, both within and across individuals.     

The Cognitive Linkage and Divergence of Spelling and Reading Development

This study aimed to investigate to what extent reading and spelling share cognitive processes at different phases of literacy acquisition. The contributions of phonological awareness, letter-sound matching skills, and rapid naming (RAN) to spelling and reading were measured in a large sample with Dutch children (N?=?1,284) covering all primary school grades. The results indicated a different developmental pattern for spelling than for reading. At initial phases of literacy acquisition, phonological awareness and letter-sound matching skills contributed to both reading and spelling performance. However, in contrast to the declining influence of phonological awareness and letter-sound matching skills on fluent word reading (see also Vaessen & Blomert, 2010 Vaessen, A. and Blomert, L. 2010. Long term cognitive dynamics of fluent reading development. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 105: 213–231. doi:10.1016/j.jecp.2009.11.005[Crossref], [PubMed], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]), the contributions of these skills to spelling performance were stable over the years, suggesting an ongoing reliance on orthography/phonology mappings during spelling. RAN did not contribute to spelling performance in any of the grades, in contrast to its strong contribution to reading performance, suggesting that RAN captures a cognitive skill that is unique for reading acquisition.     

教育隐喻：一种认知与语言视角的诠释

教育作为一种复杂现象、一种文化—心理过程、一种精神交往的艺术是难以用精确的概念加以认知与表征的。教育隐喻不仅是人们认知教育活动的重要思维工具,更是教育叙述的重要方式。通过对教育隐喻的解读,不仅可以了解教育隐喻的生成背景,同时可以了解教育隐喻创生个体的教育理解与教育信念,为研究教师个人实践性知识提供了新视角。     

人体器官名词“足”的认知研究

在特定的语境下,名词通常会发生词类转变并产生意义转变。试图运用认知语言学的突显理论,对古汉语中人体器官名词＂足＂在动化及意义转变方面进行认知分析,为＂足＂字的准确理解和正确运用提供认知依据。