Do vocabulary,syntactic awareness,and reading comprehension in second language facilitate the development of each other in young children?

This study explored whether children's second language (L2) vocabulary, syntactic awareness, and reading comprehension contributed to the growth of each other. A total of 184 Chinese primary school children (91 girls) aged 8–10 years old in Hong Kong participated in the pre-test of this study. Among them, 88 were in Grade 3 and 96 were in Grade 4. One year later, 178 of these children also participated in the post-test. These children learned English as an L2 at school. They completed a series of English language tasks. The results from a cross-lagged panel model show that vocabulary predicted the growth of syntactic awareness and reading comprehension. Syntactic awareness predicted the growth of vocabulary and reading comprehension. Reading comprehension facilitated the growth of vocabulary, and it also predicted the growth of syntactic awareness in Grade 4 students but not in Grade 3 students. Implications for teaching children an L2 are discussed.     

4-5岁幼儿把字句和被字句句法意识发展的特点

采用句法判断和句法修改任务,探讨了4-5岁幼儿把字句和被字句句法意识的发展特点。结果表明:(1)4-5岁幼儿把字句和被字句的句法意识有显著发展,这主要表现在5岁儿童的句法修改成绩显著高于4岁儿童;(2)句法错误句子的类型影响句法判断成绩,表明他们在不同句法规则的句法意识的发展是不同步的;(3)4至5岁幼儿的句法修改成绩受到个人生活经验和句子语义的影响,表明他们的句法意识还处于较低的发展水平。     

Metalinguistic skills and vocabulary knowledge in Chinese (L1) and English (L2)

How are metalinguistic skills associated with vocabulary knowledge in languages with contrasting phonological and morphological properties? To address this question, tasks of phonological awareness and morphological awareness, other reasoning and literacy-related skills, and measures of vocabulary knowledge in Chinese and English, were administered to 217 Hong Kong Chinese kindergarten children learning English as a second language. Syllable-level awareness but not phoneme onset awareness was strongly associated with Chinese vocabulary knowledge; phoneme onset awareness but not syllable awareness was associated with English vocabulary knowledge. In hierarchical regression equations, phonological awareness in English explained unique variance in English vocabulary knowledge but not in Chinese vocabulary knowledge. In contrast, measures of morphological awareness, which were strongly associated with syllable awareness, uniquely explained 13% of the variance in Chinese vocabulary knowledge apart from all other measures included but were not uniquely associated with English vocabulary knowledge. Findings highlight the strong overlap across phonological and morphological awareness in Chinese and the different associations of each to vocabulary acquisition in Chinese (L1) and English (L2) languages.     

初一英语语音意识、句法意识、工作记忆与英语阅读的关系

通过使用音素定位、句法更正、句子尾词记忆.单词阅读、句子理解和短文理解任务探查了初一学生英语语音意识,句法意识和工作记忆与单词阅读、句子阅读和短文阅读等不同层次阅读的关系,以及阅读水平高低不同学生在元语言意识的差异.结果发现,英语阅读水平高低两组学生在英语语音意识、句法意识和工作记忆方面有显著差异.回归分析发现,英语句法意识对不同层次阅读都具有最显著的预测作用,但英语语音意识只对短文阅读理解有显著预测作用,工作记忆对不同层次阅读的预测都不显著,表明英语句法意识是初一学生英语阅读的重要预测变量.     

The Development of Reading Skills in Children With English as a Second Language

One goal of this longitudinal study was to examine whether the predictors of reading skills in Grade 3 would differ between English as a second language (ESL) students and native English-speaking (L1) students. Phonological processing, syntactic awareness, memory, spelling, word reading, and lexical access skills were assessed in kindergarten and in Grade 3. The results indicated that in kindergarten, the ESL group had significantly lower scores on phonological processing, syntactic awareness, spelling, and memory for sentences tasks. However, in Grade 3, the ESL group performed in a similar way to the L1 group except on the syntactic awareness task. The combination of the two kindergarten measures, memory for sentences and Oral Cloze, and the combination of phonological processing and letter identification all contributed equally to predicting the L1 students' word-reading skills. However, for ESL students, letter identification and phonological processing made much larger contributions to predicting Grade 3 reading ability. Another goal of this study was to assess the procedures used to identify reading disability in the ESL and L1 student sample. Performance on two measures—letter identification and phonological awareness in kindergarten—predicted whether students would be classified in Grade 3 as at risk or having typical reading development for the ESL and L1 groups. The ESL children developed strong reading skills, and their status as ESL speakers did not put them at risk for reading difficulties in Grade 3. ESL students were not at any particular risk for reading difficulties after 4 years in Canadian schooling with an adequate balanced literacy program.     

4～5岁幼儿句法意识的发展

采用句法判断和句法更正任务,本研究探讨了4～5岁幼儿句法意识的发展过程和内在机制。结果表明:(1)4～5岁幼儿的句法意识有显著发展,这主要表现在5岁儿童的句法更正成绩显著高于4岁儿童;(2)句法错误类型影响句法更正成绩,表明他们在不同句法规则的句法意识的发展是不同步的;(3)从4到5岁,个人经验在句法更正中的作用下降,儿童的注意从个人经验和句子意义转向句子的意义和语法规则,揭示了幼儿句法意识逐渐从句子内容转向句子形式的发展趋势。     

The relations between children's linguistic awareness and spelling: The case of the apostrophe

In a longitudinal study, we looked at the link between children'sunderstanding of a morphemically-based orthographic rule and theirawareness of morphemic distinctions. The orthographic rule in question wasthe use of the apostrophe to denote possession in English. Early on in thestudy, we gave the children phonological, semantic/syntactic and morpho-syntactic awareness tasks, and later we gave them a spelling task in whichthey had to write words which were either genitives (e.g., `boy's') ornominative or accusative plurals (e.g., `boys'). Eight- to 10-year-oldchildren found this task difficult, but their performance improved to someextent with age. The morpho-syntactic, but not the phonological orsemantic/syntactic, awareness tasks predicted how well the children placedapostrophes in genitive words and omitted them from plural words. Weconclude that different forms of linguistic awareness affect differentaspects of reading and spelling. Learning about spelling patterns based onmorphemes is heavily influenced by children's morpho-syntactic awarenessbut not, apparently, by other forms of linguistic awareness.     

论二语习得者句法意识的培养

句法意识是指个体反思句子结构形式的能力,是元语言意识的一个重要组成部分。句法结构跟人的意识结构之间有一种自然的联系,因此句法意识的培养是习得句法的首要条件。     

The relationship between syntactic awareness and reading performance

This study was designed to examine the relationship between syntactic awareness and reading performance. A major concern was to provide an estimate of the effect of syntactic training that was not confounded with training that focused on semantic features of words. The training exercises used in the study focused on all levels of syntactic awareness in order that the effect of such training could be assessed on students’ performance on tasks that tapped each of the levels. Results of this study showed that syntactic awareness could be improved through training. The effect was stable, being apparent at the two post-test times. However, no evidence was found for a systematic effect of improved syntactic awareness on reading ability. Moreover, syntactic training did not show any greater effect than no treatment or semantic training on children’s grammatic comprehension, their ability to use fix-up strategies, or on their general reading ability score. Training had a different impact on the accuracy of oral reading for the syntactic and semantic training groups. Thus, in terms of the developmental sequence of syntactic awareness proposed by Gombert (1992), children trained in the cloze procedure improved at the two highest levels, whilst showing neither a corresponding change in the lower levels of awareness, nor improved functional reading performance.     

Development of phonological, morphological, and orthographic knowledge in young spellers: The case of inflected verbs

This study was designed to simultaneously investigate the influence of phonological, morphological, and orthographic awareness skills on the ability to spell inflected verbs in structured spelling tasks. Children in grades 1, 2, and 3 (n=103) spelled inflected past and progressive tense verbs and completed awareness tasks. Developmental changes occurred in the ability to include the inflected ending, to spell the ending consistently reflecting the correct morphological unit, and to affix the ending using the correct orthographic pattern. The contributions of phonological, morphological, and orthographic awareness to spelling development varied across the three grades but were similar for each sub-component, suggesting a developmental relationship between the ability to spell inflected verbs and linguistic and orthographic awareness.     

The Roles of Phonological and Syntactic Awareness in the Use of Plural Morphemes Among Children in French Immersion

English-speaking children in French immersion were tested to compare the spelling of the plural in English and French and to explore the factors involved in this development. Spelling of plural morphemes in French was more difficult than in English, suggesting that articulated features of a word are easier to spell than unarticulated ones. Very few French immersion children spelled correctly any of the French irregular plural form -aux. Hierarchical regression analyses showed that auditory analysis, but not syntactic awareness, shared significant portions of variance with measures of spelling. Overall, these findings suggest that phonological factors affect the spelling of morphemes and that skills in phonological awareness are uniquely associated with the development of the spelling of plural morphemes.     

The impact of L1 writing system on ESL knowledge of vowel and consonant spellings

Orthographic knowledge, the general ability to learn, store, and use information about the orthographic form of words (Stanovich & West, 1989), is a crucial skill for supporting literacy. Although the development of first language (L1) orthographic awareness is impacted by the characteristics of a learner’s L1 writing system, relatively little is known about what impact the L1 may have on second language (L2) orthographic awareness. In this study, English language learners from three L1s (French, Hebrew, Mandarin Chinese), plus L1 English speakers, were tested on their English spelling knowledge using a word-pseudohomophone discrimination task. In addition to allowing for the cross-linguistic comparisons, items were designed to examine whether learners had differing performance on pseudohomophones (misspellings) that targeted vowels versus consonants. Consistent with previous research (e.g., McBride-Chang, Bialystok, Cong, & Li, 2004), the L1 Chinese speakers had the highest (L2) accuracy, followed by the L1 Hebrew and the L1 French speakers. The participants from non-alphabetic languages (Hebrew and Chinese) had significantly lower accuracy on items with misspellings involving vowels compared to consonants, and the size of the vowel-consonant accuracy difference varied substantially across L1 groups. The results demonstrate that the characteristics of a learner’s L1 writing system, particularly the existence of vowel and consonant graphemes, impact the development of L2 orthographic knowledge and sensitivity to different types of word misspellings.     

Synergetic effects of phonological awareness,vocabulary, and word reading on bilingual children’s reading comprehension: A three-year study

Using comparable measures of first language (L1) Chinese and second language (L2) English, this three-year longitudinal study examined the synergetic effects of phonological awareness, vocabulary, and word reading on reading comprehension development among 227 Hong Kong Chinese-English bilinguals from Grades 2-4. Structural equation growth modeling revealed that all three factors were significantly linked to one another and to initial reading comprehension for each language. Across languages, L1 Chinese vocabulary was directly linked to initial L2 English reading comprehension, while L1 Chinese phonological awareness was indirectly linked to initial L2 English reading comprehension via L2 English vocabulary and word reading. These findings underscore the synergetic effects of early phonological and lexical skills in determining early reading comprehension ability in both L1 and L2.     

Cognate Awareness in French Immersion Students: Contributions to Grade 2 Reading Comprehension

Cognate awareness is the ability to recognize the cognate relationship between words in two etymologically related languages. The current study examined the development of cognate awareness and its contribution to French (second language) reading comprehension among Canadian French immersion children. Eighty-one students were tested at the end of Grade 1 and again at the end of Grade 2. Children were administered a cognate awareness task in French, in which they were asked to decide whether a French word had a cognate in English. Overall, performance on the cognate awareness task was significantly above chance at both time points, and it improved overtime. Thus, for the majority of the participants, cognate awareness was evident as early as first grade. Regressions revealed that cognate awareness measured in Grades 1 and 2 made a significant contribution to Grade 2 French reading comprehension, beyond multiple controls. The results of the study suggest that cognate awareness is a unique aspect of second-language reading comprehension in young bilingual children.     

Investigating Cognitive and Linguistic Abilities that Influence the Reading Comprehension Skills of Children from Diverse Linguistic Backgrounds

This study investigated the influence of cognitive and linguistic skills on the reading comprehension performance of a group of learners from diverse linguistic backgrounds. The study also compared the reading comprehension performance of grade 4 children who entered kindergarten with little or no experience with English (ESL) to that of a group of native English speakers. Examiners administered various tasks of reading, language, and memory to the children in the study (n=480). The sample included three comprehension groups: (1) children with poor comprehension in the absence of word reading difficulties (Poor Comprehenders; PC), (2) children with poor word reading and poor comprehension (Poor word Recognition and comprehenders; PR), and (3) children with good word reading and comprehension abilities (Good Comprehenders; GC). Due to the small sample size of PR reader group, no comparative analyses were conducted. However, the results indicated that within the GC and PC groups there were no differences between the ESL and L1 children on measures of reading and phonological processing. Further, within the GC and PC groups, on measures of syntactic awareness and verbal working memory, the ESL speakers performed at significantly lower levels than the L1 speakers.     

The development of reading comprehension skills in children learning English as a second language

Reading comprehension is a multi-dimensional process that includes the reader, the text, and factors associated with the activity of reading. Most research and theories of comprehension are based primarily on research conducted with monolingual English speakers (L1). The present study was designed to investigate the cognitive and linguistic factors that have an influence on reading comprehension in English-as-a-Second-Language (ESL) speakers. The cognitive aspects of reading comprehension among L1 speakers and ESL speakers in the seventh grade were investigated. The performance of both groups was compared and the role of some relevant processes, including word reading, word reading fluency, phonological awareness, working memory, and morphological and syntactic awareness were assessed. Within this sample, three groups were examined: (1) children with poor comprehension (PC) in the absence of word reading difficulties (2) children with poor word reading and poor comprehension (poor readers, PR) (3) and children with both good word reading and comprehension abilities (good comprehenders, GC). The results demonstrated that a variety of cognitive processes, such as working memory and phonological, syntactic, and morphological awareness are important for reading comprehension and compromised in poor comprehenders. The GC group performed better than the PC group on all of the cognitive measures, indicating that comprehension depends on a variety of phonological, memory and linguistic processes and that adequate word recognition skill are important for reading comprehension. The prevalence of the ESL and L1 students was similar across the three reading groups. The ESL and L1 students demonstrated similar performance, indicating that the skills underlying reading comprehension are similar in the ESL and L1 students. This study demonstrated that ESL students are capable of developing word reading and reading comprehension skills that are as strong as those of their L1 peers.     

Difficulties in L2 Hebrew Reading in Russian-speaking Second Graders

The present study examined factors that influence the process of learning to read in a second language. The Hebrew reading comprehension skills of 68 Russian-speaking children (mean age 7 years 6 months) were screened at the start of Grade 2. From this sample, 40 participants were selected: 20 successful learners and 20 unsuccessful learners. These two groups were then tested on a wide range of language skills (e.g., phonological processing, vocabulary, syntactic and morphological awareness) in both languages (Hebrew and Russian) and reading skills in Hebrew (e.g., reading speed and accuracy). Two factors, level of spoken Hebrew and phonological awareness deficits in both languages, were significant. Phonological awareness difficulties constituted the key factor associated with poor decoding whereas insufficient mastery of spoken Hebrew was important in the case of reading comprehension. An interesting dissociation was also found in our poor readers between impaired phonological awareness and other unimpaired phonological processing abilities such as oral pseudoword repetition and working memory. These findings suggest that, in addition to poor spoken L2 proficiency, poor readers are characterized more by a metalinguistic rather than a linguistic deficit in their native tongue.     

基于句法结构培养差异的英语复句处理能力研究

了解和把握句法结构培养程度对中国学习者处理英语复句能力的影响是英语教学质量保障的关键。 本研究采用问卷调查和阅读行为测试两种方法, 选取60名所受不同句法结构培养的中国英语学习者和20 名英国本族语者为样本, 对其在四种罕见英语复句形态结构复杂性、 语义通达性的判断及复句理解准确度方面的处理能力进行研究。 我们发现, 随着句法结构培养水平的提高, 中国学习者在英语复句理解准确度及语义通达性判断方面表现为超过或接近英语本族语者的趋势 ; 而在复句形态结构复杂性判断方面却没有表现出随句法结构培养水平的提高而呈上升的趋势。 此外, 由于句法结构培养水平的不同, 中国学习者在英语复句的处理方法上受句法结构和语义因素的影响也有差异 。