Changing relations between phonological processing abilities and word-level reading as children develop from beginning to skilled readers: A 5-year longitudinal study.

Abstract

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

Working memory in children with reading disabilities

“…In typically developing samples of children, scores on complex memory tasks predict reading achievement independently of measures of phonological shortterm memory (e.g., Swanson, 2003;Swanson & Howell, 2001). Current evidence suggests that although phonological short-term memory is significantly associated with reading achievements over the early years of reading instruction, its role is as part of a general phonological processing construct related to reading development rather than representing a causal factor per se (Wagner et al, 1997;Wagner & Muse, in press). It is also well established that children with reading disabilities show significant and marked decrements on working memory tasks relative to typically developing individuals (Siegel & Ryan, 1989;Swanson, 1994Swanson, , 1999Swanson, Ashbaker, & Lee, 1996).…”

Socioeconomic background modulates cognition–achievement relationships in reading

“…Empirical evidence for this has come from the fact that preliterate children who have better PA skills are in turn quicker to learn to read (Wagner & Torgesen, 1987), and that both the absolute level (Share, Jorm, MacLean, & Mathews, 1984) and rate of acquisition (Byrne, Fielding-Barnesley, & Ashley, 2000) of early PA skills are excellent predictors of elementary reading skills. Wagner et al (1997) found that individual differences in PA persisted in explaining reading abilities each year from kindergarten through fourth grade, whereas the relationships between reading and other skills faded with development. In fact, kindergarten PA is a better predictor of teenage reading ability than is kindergarten reading skill (MacDonald & Cornwall, 1995).…”

Early emergence of deviant frontal fMRI activity for phonological processes in poor beginning readers

“…For reading acquisition in alphabetic writing systems, preliminary awareness of the sound structure of oral language is beneficial (Bradley and Bryant, 1983;West and Stanovich, 1986). Children with dyslexia have difficulties or even miss to develop phonological awareness (Shaywitz and Shaywitz, 2005;Wagner and Torgesen, 1987;Wagner et al, 1997). They often struggle from the very start when learning the alphabetic principles that involve knowledge of grapheme-phoneme correspondences, which initialize the emergence of print sensitive brain networks (Brem et al, 2010) and, in turn, critically affect reading accuracy and speed as well as spelling and writing (Ehri, 1998;Snowling, 2000).…”