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S A quantitative meta‐analysis evaluating the effects of phonemic awareness (PA) instruction on learning to read and spell was conducted by the National Reading Panel. There were 52 studies published in peer‐reviewed journals, and these contributed 96 cases comparing the outcomes of treatment and control groups. Analysis of effect sizes revealed that the impact of PA instruction on helping children acquire PA was large and statistically significant (d = 0.86). PA instruction exerted a moderate, statistically significant impact on reading (d = 0.53) and spelling (d = 0.59). Not only word reading but also reading comprehension benefited. PA instruction impacted reading under all the conditions examined although effect sizes were larger under some conditions. PA instruction helped various types of children: normally developing readers as well as at‐risk and disabled readers; preschoolers, kindergartners, and first graders; low socioeconomic status children as well as mid‐high SES. PA instruction improved reading, but it did not improve spelling in disabled readers. PA instruction was more effective when it was taught with letters than without letters, when one or two PA skills were taught than multiple PA skills, when children were taught in small groups than individually or in classrooms, and when instruction lasted between 5 and 18 hours rather than longer. Classroom teachers were effective in teaching PA to their students. Effect sizes were larger for studies using more rigorous experimental designs, with rigor assessments drawn from Troia (1999). In sum, PA instruction was found to make a statistically significant contribution to reading acquisition. [See also a letter to the editors regarding this article, and the first author's response: http://dx.doi.org/10.1598/RRQ.37.2.1] Un meta‐análisis cuantitativo que evaluó los efectos de la instrucción en conciencia fonémica (CF) sobre el aprendizaje de la lectura y la escritura fue llevado a cabo por el Panel Nacional de Lectura (National Reading Panel). Se tomaron 52 estudios, publicados en revistas con referato, que aportaron 96 casos en los que se comparó el resultado de los grupos de tratamiento y de control. El análisis de las magnitudes del efecto reveló que el impacto de la instrucción en CF sobre el desarrollo de la CF en los niños fue grande y estadísticamente significativo (d = 0.86). La instrucción en CF ejerció un impacto moderado, estadísticamente significativo en la lectura (d = 0.53) y escritura (d = 0.59). No sólo se benefició la lectura de palabras, sino también la comprensión lectora. La instrucción en CF impactó en la lectura, en todas las condiciones examinadas, sin embargo las magnitudes del efecto fueron mayores en algunas condiciones. La instrucción en CF ayudó a distintos tipos de niños: lectores de desarrollo normal, lectores de riesgo y lectores con dificultades; niños de jardín, preescolar y primer grado; niños de NSE bajo y niños de NSE medio‐alto. La instrucción en CF mejoró la lectura pero no la escritura en los lectores con difi...

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One of the great mysteries confronting literacy researchers is how mature readers are able to read written materials so rapidly and fluently yet with full comprehension (Adams, 1990; Barron, 1986; Chall, 1983;Perfetti, 1985; Rayner and' Pollatsek, 1989). A capability that has proven central in explaining this feat is the ability to read single words rapidly and automatically by sight (LaBerge and Samuels, 1974). Readers are able to look at a word and immediately recognize its meaning without expending any effort decoding the word. Moreover, sight of the word triggers recognition despite readers' intention to ignore the word (Guttentag and Haith, 1978). A major task for researchers has been to explain how beginners acquire the ability to recognize sight words rapidly and automatically.There are other ways that words might be read, but these are used mainly for words not known by sight (Ehri, 1991(Ehri, , 1994. Decoding or phonological recoding refers to the process of transforming graphemes into phonemes and blending the phonemes into pronunciations. Reading by analogy refers to the process of using known sight words to read unknown words that share letters, for example, reading BLIGHT by analogy to NIGHT (Cunningham, 1976;Goswami and Bryant, 1990;Marsh et al., 1981). Reading by predicting refers to the process of generating educated guesses about words based on context cues or initial letters or both (Goodman, 1976). Although these other means of reading words are available to readers, sight word reading is invoked the most because this process is fast and automatic.It is important to dispel misconceptions about sight word reading. It is not true that only irregularly spelled words are read by sight. Rather all words, even easily decoded.words, become sight words once they have been read several times. Also, it is not true that sight word reading refers to the flashcard method of teaching students to read words. Sight word reading refers not to a method of teaching reading but to the process of reading words by accessing them in memory (Ehri, 1992). Another misconception is that sight word learning involves memorizing the shapes of words or other visual features and has nothing to do with letter-sound correspondences. This is not true. The research we have conducted over the years 0 United Kingdom Reading Association 1995. Published by Blackwell Publishers, . Beginners need some decoding skill to read words by analogy. Reading Research Quarterly, 27, 12-26. EHRI, L. c . , and WILCE, L. s. (1982). The salience of silent letters in children's memory for word spellings. , 10, 155-166. EHRI. L. c . , and WILCE, L. s. (1983). Development of word identification speed in skilled and less skilled beginning readers. Journal of Educational Psychology, 75, 3-1 8 . EHRI, L. c.. and WILCE, L. s. (1985). Movement into reading: Is the first stage of printed word learning visual or phonetic? Memory and Cognition