A preliminary investigation of akshara knowledge in the Malayalam alphasyllabary: extension of Nag’s (2007) study

Tiwari, Shivani; Nair, R.; Krishnan, Gopee

doi:10.1093/wsr/wsr013

Cited by 27 publications

(20 citation statements)

References 10 publications

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“…The Hindi akshara , the basic unit of writing, represents approximately one spoken syllable (Nag, Caravolas & Snowling, 2011). Initial literacy instruction in alphasyllabic orthographies like Hindi focuses on acquisition and mastery of the aksharamālā or repertory of characters, and on learning to read by assembling simple aksharas (Nag, 2007; Tiwari, Nair & Krishnan, 2011). Although data on phonological awareness in beginning Hindi readers is unavailable, evidence from alphasyllabaries like Kannada and Telugu indicates that successful early readers of these languages exhibit awareness of syllable but not phoneme level units (Vasanta, 2004; Nag, 2007), suggesting that early reading in an alphasyllabary may rely predominantly on phonological awareness at the level of syllables.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A role for putamen in phonological processing in children

et al. 2016

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Bilingual children are required to successfully develop phonological skills in two languages, yet little is known about the neural correlates associated with them. We obtained structural imaging data from 30 Hindi–English children aged between 8 and 10 years and used voxel based morphometry to explore neuroanatomical correlates of behavioural measures of phonological awareness. Our results showed that phonological skills in English are predicted by grey matter volume of bilateral putamen, but solely by right putamen in Hindi. Post-hoc analysis revealed that English nonword reading correlates with grey matter volume in bilateral putamen while in Hindi nonword reading it correlates only with right putamen. These differences in putamen-based mechanisms indicate that syllable level awareness sufficiently supports early literacy in the transparent, alphasyllabic Hindi orthography whereas that in English requires both phonemic and syllabic level awareness. Our findings point towards a key role for putamen in mediating phonological and reading skills in children.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A role for putamen in phonological processing in children

et al. 2016

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“…However, unlike other transparent orthographies like Spanish, for example, akshara learners need a longer time to master decoding possibly because of an extraordinarily large set of syllabographs that must be learned. Studies of akshara processing have shown that both syllable and phoneme awareness are needed for word decoding (Joshi, ; Nag, Snowling, Quinlan, & Hulme, ; Reddy & Koda, ; Sircar & Nag, ; Tiwari, ) but that the pace of acquisition of syllabic awareness is faster than that of phonemic awareness, with increasing sensitivity to subsyllabic information developing slower than syllable level awareness (Nag, ; Vasanta, ). These studies highlight the dual syllabic and phonemic requirements for decoding acquisition in akshara and suggest that this relationship is different at different levels of reading mastery.…”

Section: Research On Reading Acquisition In Indiamentioning

confidence: 99%

Reading Research and Practice: Indian Perspective

Joshi

Nakamura

Singh

2017

New Directions for Child and Adolescent Development

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“…Alphasyllabaries are phonologically and orthographically different from alphabetic writing systems and share features of both alphabetic and syllabic writing systems. Previous studies have illustrated clear differences between alphabetic and alphasyllabaries languages (e.g., Nag, 2007;Nag, 2014;Tiwari et al, 2011). Alphasyllabaries represent sounds at the level of the syllable called akshara, but have distinct features to indicate sub-syllabic information (Bright, 1999).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Another study was conducted by Tiwari et al (2011) in Malayalam, which is another alphasyllabary language. This study investigated akshara knowledge in Grade III children learning to read alphasyllabary.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…They also reported that consonant with vowel diacritics was mastered much better than consonant clusters. Nag (2007) and Tiwari et al (2011) have indicated that the acquisition of akshara knowledge continues beyond Grade III in Malayalam and Grade IV in Kannada. However, there is a paucity of data beyond Grade IV in alphasyllabary languages, specifically in Kannada.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Kannada akshara knowledge in primary school children: measurement of accuracy and reaction time using a cross-sectional study design

et al. 2020

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Background: Reading acquisition varies between languages, as languages differ in terms of phonology and orthography. Orthographic knowledge is demonstrated to be crucial in literacy acquisition in most orthographies. The literature on acquisition of orthographic knowledge has focused more on alphabetic orthographies and less is understood in alphasyllabary Kannada language. The present study aimed to understand the akshara knowledge acquisition by measuring akshara identification accuracy and reaction time in typically developing Kannada medium primary school children. Methods: The study consisted of 315 typically developing children, 45 each from Grade I through Grade VII between the age range of 5 years 6 months to 12 years 6 months. The children were assessed for akshara identification accuracy and reaction time using a representative sample of 67 akshara selected at four different levels of complexity: vowels in primary form, consonant with inherent vowels, consonant with vowel diacritics, and consonant clusters. The mean performance was compared between the groups using one-way ANOVA with post-hoc Bonferroni test. Results: One-way ANOVA revealed significant main effect (p≤0.05) of Grade on akshara identification accuracy and reaction time. The post-hoc Bonferroni test revealed that the mean akshara identification accuracy improved significantly (p≤0.05) from Grade I to Grade V and reached a plateau at Grade VI. The reaction time significantly reduced from Grade I to Grade IV and there was no significant change beyond Grade V. Conclusion: The children learning to read alphasyllabary Kannada gain mastery over the majority of aksharas during the initial years of formal schooling, which develops completely by Grade VI. The automaticity in naming akshara develops gradually and reaches a plateau by Grade IV. The present findings indicate that children acquire automaticity in naming akshara early, while the akshara knowledge continues to develop.

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A preliminary investigation of akshara knowledge in the Malayalam alphasyllabary: extension of Nag’s (2007) study

Cited by 27 publications

References 10 publications

A role for putamen in phonological processing in children

A role for putamen in phonological processing in children

Reading Research and Practice: Indian Perspective

Kannada akshara knowledge in primary school children: measurement of accuracy and reaction time using a cross-sectional study design

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