scholarly journals Word recognition strategies amongst isiXhosa/English bilingual learners: The interaction of orthography and language of learning and teaching

2016 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Tracy Probert ◽  
Mark De Vos
Keyword(s):  
Word Recognition ◽  
Reading Strategies ◽  
Cognitive Skills ◽  
Word Reading ◽  
Skills Transfer ◽  
Transparent Orthography ◽  
Learning And Teaching ◽  
Multilingual Education ◽  
Opaque Orthography ◽  
Metalinguistic Skills

Word recognition is a major component of fluent reading and involves an interaction of language structure, orthography, and metalinguistic skills. This study examined reading strategies in isiXhosa and the transfer of these strategies to an additional language, English. IsiXhosa was chosen because of its agglutinative structure and conjunctive orthography. Data was collected at two schools which differed with regards to their language of learning and teaching (LoLT) in the first three years of schooling: isiXhosa and English respectively. Participants completed a wordand pseudo-word reading aloud task in each of two languages which hypothetically impose different cognitive demands. Skills transfer occurs to a limited extent when the language of first literacy uses a transparent orthography, but is less predictable when the language of first literacy uses an opaque orthography. We show that although there is transfer of word recognition strategies from transparent to deep orthographies, felicitous transfer is limited to sublexical strategies; infelicitous transfer also occurs when lexical strategies are transferred in problematic ways. The results support the contention that reading strategies and cognitive skills are fine tuned to particular languages. This study emphasises that literacies in different languages present readers with different structural puzzles which require language-particular suites of cognitive reading skills. Keywords: Foundation phase education; multilingual education; reading; word recognition; automaticity; isiXhosa reading

scholarly journals Phonological awareness and learning to read in Afrikaans: The role of working memory

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Marizel Scheepers ◽  
Salomé Geertsema ◽  
Mia Le Roux ◽  
Marien Graham
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
Phonological Awareness ◽  
Phonemic Awareness ◽  
Reading Skills ◽  
Word Reading ◽  
Transparent Orthography ◽  
Learning And Teaching ◽  
Descriptive Research ◽  
Opaque Orthography

Background: Phonological awareness (PA) skills and working memory (WM) are universally regarded as crucial precursors to skilled reading. The orthography of the language being read influences the ease with which a child learns to read. Research has been undertaken on reading in languages with an opaque orthography. Research on the role of PA and WM in Afrikaans with its transparent orthography is limited.Aim: The study investigated and described the role of WM in the acquisition of PA and ultimately reading in Afrikaans.Setting: The research study was conducted in private schools with Afrikaans as the language of learning and teaching (LoLT) in Grade 2.Method: A descriptive research design with correlational components was applied.Results: Phonetic decoding was employed more than eidetic decoding. Word reading skills developed rapidly and exceeded the expectations in the first two quarters of the year. Participants who read the comprehension test fluently scored higher on the questions than those who did not read fluently. The correlation between WM and reading comprehension was not statistically significant. The statistically significant correlation between WM and word reading seems to be present in both transparent and opaque orthographies. The statistically significant correlation between PA and word reading was not found in other transparent orthographies. The correlation between phonemic awareness (PhA) and word reading is the same in other orthographies.Conclusion: The statistically significant correlation between WM and word reading indicates that WM supports reading development as the ability to hold information in memory supports phoneme-grapheme associations.

scholarly journals Computer Speech-Based Remediation for Reading Disabilities: The Size of Spelling-to-Sound Unit in a Transparent Orthography

2007 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 52-67 ◽  
Author(s):  
Juan E. Jiménez ◽  
Isabel Hernández-Valle ◽  
Gustavo Ramírez ◽  
Mª del Rosario Ortiz ◽  
Mercedes Rodrigo ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Word Recognition ◽  
Reading Disabilities ◽  
Word Reading ◽  
Low Frequency ◽  
Training Group ◽  
Control Group ◽  
Word Decoding ◽  
Transparent Orthography ◽  
Computer Based ◽  
Computer Speech

This study was designed to assess the effects of four reading-training procedures for children with reading disabilities (RD) in a transparent orthography, with the aim of examining the effects of different spelling-to-sound units in computer speech-based reading. We selected a sample of 83 Spanish children aged between 7 years 1 month and 10 years 6 months (M = 105.2, SD = 7.8) whose pseudoword reading performance was below the 25th percentile and IQ > 90. The participants were randomly assigned to five groups: (a) the whole-word training group (WW) (n = 17), (b) the syllable training group (S)(n = 16), (c) the onset-rime training group (OR) (n = 17), (d) the phoneme training group (P) (n = 15), and (e) the untrained control group (n = 18). Children were pre- and post-tested in word recognition, reading comprehension, phonological awareness, and orthographic and phonological tasks. The results indicate that experimental groups who participated in the phoneme and syllable conditions improved their word recognition in comparison with the control group. In addition, dyslexics who participated in the phoneme, syllable, and onset-rime conditions made a greater number of requests during computer-based word reading under conditions that required extensive phonological computation (low frequency words and long words). Reading time, however, was greater for long words in the phoneme group during computer-based reading. These results suggest the importance of training phonological processes in improving word decoding in children with dyslexia who learn in a consistent orthography.

Unpacking Direct and Indirect Relationships of Short-Term Memory to Word Reading: Evidence From Korean-Speaking Children

2017 ◽  
Vol 51 (5) ◽  
pp. 473-481 ◽  
Author(s):  
Young-Suk Grace Kim ◽  
Jeung-Ryeul Cho ◽  
Soon-Gil Park
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Skills ◽  
Short Term Memory ◽  
Word Reading ◽  
Cognitive Capacity ◽  
Rapid Automatized Naming ◽  
Metalinguistic Awareness ◽  
Short Term ◽  
Term Memory ◽  
Transparent Orthography ◽  
Relation Model

We examined the relations of short-term memory (STM), metalinguistic awareness (phonological, morphological, and orthographic awareness), and rapid automatized naming (RAN) to word reading in Korean, a language with a relatively transparent orthography. STM, metalinguistic awareness, and RAN have been shown to be important to word reading, but the nature of the relations of STM, metalinguistic awareness, and RAN to word reading has rarely been investigated. Two alternative models were fitted. In the indirect relation model, STM was hypothesized to be indirectly related to word reading via metalinguistic awareness and RAN. In the direct and indirect relations model, STM was hypothesized to be directly and indirectly related to word reading. Results from 207 beginning readers in South Korea showed that STM was directly related to word reading as well as indirectly via metalinguistic awareness and RAN. Although the direct effect of STM was relatively small (.16), the total effect incorporating the indirect effect was substantial (.42). These results suggest that STM is an important, foundational cognitive capacity that underpins metalinguistic awareness and RAN as well as word reading, and further indicate the importance of considering both direct and indirect effects of language and cognitive skills on word reading.

Developmental Changes in Word Recognition: An Information-Processing Account

1986 ◽  
Vol 38 (3) ◽  
pp. 395-418 ◽  
Author(s):  
Linda Pring ◽  
Maggie Snowling
Keyword(s):  
Word Recognition ◽  
Conceptual Knowledge ◽  
Context Effect ◽  
Word Reading ◽  
Contextual Information ◽  
Developmental Changes ◽  
Learning To Read ◽  
Young Readers ◽  
Single Word Reading ◽  
First Time

Two experiments examining developmental changes in the use of context in single word reading are reported. The first experiment investigated how effectively children can access conceptual knowledge and use this to help their word recognition. The results indicated that young readers can on demand direct their attention to semantic information, and this allows them to reap a relatively greater benefit from context than older more skilful readers. The second experiment attempted to clarify the way such use of contextual information might help in the specific case when a child attempts to decode a new word for the first time. Skilled and unskilled readers pronounced pseudohomophonic nonwords faster when they were primed by a semantic context, and the context effect was greater for unskilled readers. The nonword's graphemic similarity to a lexical item was also important. In general, the results were consistent with Stanovich's (1980) interactive-compensatory model of reading, and they suggest that in learning to read, several already existing stores of information (e.g. auditory, visual and conceptual) are integrated in order to achieve a solution to the word recognition problem.

Cross-script transfer of word reading fluency in a mixed writing system: Evidence from a longitudinal study in Japanese

2018 ◽  
Vol 40 (2) ◽  
pp. 235-251 ◽  
Author(s):  
TOMOHIRO INOUE ◽  
GEORGE K. GEORGIOU ◽  
HIROFUMI IMANAKA ◽  
TAKAKO OSHIRO ◽  
HIROYUKI KITAMURA ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Longitudinal Study ◽  
Phonological Awareness ◽  
Path Analysis ◽  
Reading Fluency ◽  
Cognitive Skills ◽  
Word Reading ◽  
Morphological Awareness ◽  
Rapid Automatized Naming ◽  
Writing System ◽  
The Cross

ABSTRACTWe examined the cross-lagged relations between word reading fluency in the two orthographic systems of Japanese: phonetic (syllabic) Hiragana and morphographic Kanji. One hundred forty-two Japanese-speaking children were assessed on word reading fluency twice in Grade 1 (Times 1 and 2) and twice in Grade 2 (Times 3 and 4). Nonverbal IQ, vocabulary, phonological awareness, morphological awareness, and rapid automatized naming were also assessed in Time 1. Results of path analysis revealed that Time 1 Hiragana fluency predicted Time 2 Kanji fluency after controlling for the cognitive skills. Time 2 Hiragana fluency did not predict Time 3 Kanji fluency or vice versa after the autoregressor was controlled, but Hiragana and Kanji fluency were reciprocally related between Times 3 and 4. These findings provide evidence for a cross-script transfer of word reading fluency across the two contrastive orthographic systems, and the first evidence of fluency in a morphographic script predicting fluency development in a phonetic script within the same language.

Reading strategies of bilingual normally progressing and dyslexic readers in Hindi and English

2007 ◽  
Vol 28 (1) ◽  
pp. 47-68 ◽  
Author(s):  
ASHUM GUPTA ◽  
GULGOONA JAMAL
Keyword(s):  
Reading Strategies ◽  
Word Length ◽  
Word Reading ◽  
Age Of Acquisition ◽  
Chronological Age ◽  
Orthographic Transparency ◽  
Reading Accuracy

This study examined the reading accuracy of dyslexic readers in comparison to chronological age-matched normally progressing readers in Hindi and English using word reading tasks, matched for spoken frequency of usage, age of acquisition, imageability, and word length. Both groups showed significantly greater reading accuracy in Hindi than in English. For normally progressing readers, spoken frequency of usage had no significant effect in Hindi and a significant effect in English, whereas for dyslexic readers it had a significant effect in both languages. In Hindi, normally progressing readers produced only nonword errors; dyslexic readers produced a far greater percentage of nonword than word errors. In English, normally progressing readers produced greater percentage of word than nonword errors, whereas dyslexic readers produced greater percentage of nonword than word errors. Results are discussed in terms of orthographic transparency, sublexical, and lexical reading strategies.

scholarly journals The Emergence of Multilingual Education in India: Issues Related to Media of Instruction in Border Areas of Telangana Schools

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Suman Kothakonda
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Skills ◽  
Teaching And Learning ◽  
Linguistic Diversity ◽  
Language Skills ◽  
Indian States ◽  
Dominant Language ◽  
Proficiency Levels ◽  
Multilingual Education ◽  
Target Languages ◽  
The Right

<p>My main goal is to focus on the importance of multilingual education through translanguaging pedagogies in Telangana schools especially in the areas of minority linguistic communities. India is remarkably well-known for cultural and linguistic diversity. In such a context, it is difficult to implement the right medium of instruction in which the students’ home language is different from the school language. Though there are many factors involved in delivering quality education, language plays a significant role in teaching and learning across the world. The majority of the schools encourage dominant language(s) in teaching and learning in Indian states. As a result, students of non-dominant language(s) are totally out of the classroom conversations and they slowly come to know that their languages are less prestigious and not used in schools. This leads them to show less interest in learning. Non-dominant language(s) are pushed out of important domains and such languages are impoverished with limited functions in India. In this paper, I discuss the complexity which lies in providing the right media of instruction to heterogeneous students in Indian classrooms and also explores the students’ language(s) proficiency levels in two target languages. Finally, I explain some ways to develop students’ linguistic and cognitive skills in such a multilingual environment. Two schools were, for this study, visited to understand the language(s) scenario in the Telangana region. The data was collected from 15 students who were in the IX class.Apart from this, we interacted with teachers to get their opinions on various topics in relation to students’ language skills as well as multilingual education. Extensive individual interviews and long conversations were conducted from classroom teachers in relation to students’ language skills in three languages. The data was collected through a variety of sources in order to illuminate multilingual education in Telangana schools. Oral and written samples were collected from the participants in two languages L2 & L3. In the process of data collection, each student performed spoken as well as written tasks. Oral tasks consist of discussions, role-plays, and one storytelling task based on the provided pictures. Written tasks consist of reading, listening, and writing (vocabulary, grammar, and sentence meaning). The result of the collected data reveals the proficiency levels of students in L2 & L3. The empirical data, interviews, and conversations revealed the significance of LI in schools at the right time. </p>

scholarly journals Keeping an Eye on Effort: A Pupillometric Investigation of Effort and Effortlessness in Visual Word Recognition

2020 ◽  
pp. 095679762095863 ◽  
Author(s):  
Adi Shechter ◽  
David L. Share
Keyword(s):  
Word Recognition ◽  
Visual Word Recognition ◽  
Word Reading ◽  
Response Times ◽  
Sixth Graders ◽  
Cognitive Effort ◽  
Skill Learning ◽  
Peak Latency ◽  
Pupillary Responses ◽  
Skilled Reading

Rapid and seemingly effortless word recognition is a virtually unquestioned characteristic of skilled reading, yet the definition and operationalization of the concept of cognitive effort have proven elusive. We investigated the cognitive effort involved in oral and silent word reading using pupillometry among adults (Experiment 1, N = 30; Experiment 2, N = 20) and fourth through sixth graders (Experiment 3, N = 30; Experiment 4, N = 18). We compared multiple pupillary measures (mean, peak, and peak latency) for reading familiar words (real words) and unfamiliar letter strings (pseudowords) varying in length. Converging with the behavioral data for accuracy and response times, pupillary responses demonstrated a greater degree of cognitive effort for pseudowords compared with real words and stronger length effects for pseudowords than for real words. These findings open up new possibilities for studying the issue of effort and effortlessness in the field of word recognition and other fields of skill learning.

Modeling the Relationships between Language Skills and Sentence Comprehension among Chinese Junior Elementary Graders

2020 ◽  
Vol 22 (2) ◽  
pp. 80-116
Author(s):  
Xiao-Yun Xiao ◽  
Connie Suk-Han Ho
Keyword(s):  
Word Recognition ◽  
Word Order ◽  
Sentence Comprehension ◽  
Word Reading ◽  
Vocabulary Knowledge ◽  
Oral Narrative ◽  
Theoretical Understanding ◽  
Narrative Skills ◽  
Syntactic Skills ◽  
Reading Measures

The present study examined the contributions of vocabulary knowledge, syntactic skills, and oral narrative skills to sentence reading comprehension among Chinese junior elementary school children. Various language and reading measures were administered to 85 Chinese normally-achieving children at Grades 2 and 3 in Hong Kong. Results showed that vocabulary knowledge and oral narrative skills contributed significantly to word order skills, an important syntactic skill in Chinese. Vocabulary knowledge contributed to word recognition directly and contributed to sentence comprehension indirectly through word recognition and syntactic skills; and syntactic skills contributed to sentence comprehension directly. These findings suggest that while vocabulary knowledge is important for Chinese word reading, syntactic word order plays a central role in Chinese sentence comprehension. The implications of these findings for our theoretical understanding of the Simple View of Reading, as well as reading instruction, will be discussed.

scholarly journals Form–meaning links in the development of visual word recognition

2009 ◽  
Vol 364 (1536) ◽  
pp. 3665-3674 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kate Nation
Keyword(s):  
Word Recognition ◽  
Visual Word Recognition ◽  
Word Reading ◽  
Explicit Instruction ◽  
Reading Development ◽  
Good Deal ◽  
Visual Word ◽  
Learning To Read ◽  
Related Information

Learning to read takes time and it requires explicit instruction. Three decades of research has taught us a good deal about how children learn about the links between orthography and phonology during word reading development. However, we have learned less about the links that children build between orthographic form and meaning. This is surprising given that the goal of reading development must be for children to develop an orthographic system that allows meanings to be accessed quickly, reliably and efficiently from orthography. This review considers whether meaning-related information is used when children read words aloud, and asks what we know about how and when children make connections between form and meaning during the course of reading development.

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