Results from a longitudinal correlational study of 244 children from kindergarten through 2nd grade indicate that young children’s phonological processing abilities are well-described by 5 correlated latent abilities: phonological analysis, phonological synthesis, phonological coding in working memory, isolated naming, and serial naming. These abilities are characterized by different developmental rates and remarkably stable individual differences. Decoding did not exert a causal influence on subsequent phonological processing abilities, but letter-name knowledge did. Causal relations between phonological processing abilities and reading-related knowledge are bidirectional: Phonological processing abilities exert strong causal influences on word decoding; letter-name knowledge exerts a more modest causal influence on subsequent phonological processing abilities.

Relations between phonological processing abilities and word-level reading skills were examined in a longitudinal correlational study of 216 children. Phonological processing abilities, word-level reading skills, and vocabulary were assessed annually from kindergarten through 4th grade, as the children developed from beginning to skilled readers. Individual differences in phonological awareness were related to subsequent individual differences in word-level reading for every time period examined. Individual differences in serial naming and vocabulary were related to subsequent individual differences in word-level reading initially, but these relations faded with development. Individual differences in letter-name knowledge were related to subsequent individual differences in phonological awareness and serial naming, but there were no relations between individual differences in wordlevel reading and any subsequent phonological processing ability.Phonological processing refers to using the phonological or sound structure of oral language when one processes oral and written language (Jorm & Share, 1983; Wagner & Torgesen, 1987). Spoken words represent combinations of basic sounds or phonemes. In English, for example, there are roughly 30 to 45 basic phonemes, depending on the classification system that is used. Of the nearly infinite number of possible combinations of phonemes, only a relatively small number actually occur, and most combinations of phonemes occur in multiple words. Thus, bat and cat each contain 3 phonemes, the latter 2 of which are shared. This fact is represented by their spellings, which have different initial letters and identical medial and final letters because the spellings in alphabetic orthographies such as English represent sound as well as meaning.Developmental and individual differences in phonological processing abilities appear to be related to the acquisition of reading skills, although the direction, magnitudes, and underlying mechanisms responsible for such relations have yet to be

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The relative effectiveness of 3 instructional approaches for the prevention of reading disabilities in young children with weak phonological skills was examined. Two programs varying in the intensity of instruction in phonemic decoding were contrasted with each other and with a 3rd approach that supported the children's regular classroom reading program. The children were provided with 88 hr of one-to-one instruction beginning the second semester of kindergarten and extending through 2nd grade. The most phonemically explicit condition produced the strongest growth in word level reading skills, but there were no differences between groups in reading comprehension. Word level skills of children in the strongest group were in the middle of the average range. Growth curve analyses showed that beginning phonological skills, home background, and ratings of classroom behavior all predicted unique variance in growth of word level skills.This study was designed to contribute to our understanding of the instructional conditions that need to be in place to prevent reading disabilities in young children. Both the specific design of the study and the questions it addressed were derived from previous research and theory in two areas. The broadest context of the study is the new understanding of reading and reading disabilities we have acquired from research over the past 20 years (Adams, 1990;Metsala & Ehri, 1998), and the more focused context is previous research on instructional methods that accelerate reading development in young children who are either experiencing or are at risk for reading failure (Foorman,

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