opaque orthography
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2021 ◽  
pp. 002221942110598
Author(s):  
R. Malatesha Joshi ◽  
Kausalai Wijekumar ◽  
Amy Gillespie Rouse

This article serves as an introduction to the special issue on spelling and writing in different orthographies. Most studies and theoretical models of writing are based on the English language, and it is generally assumed that what is true for English is also true for other languages. Further, there are more studies on reading compared to studies of writing and spelling. Considering that 80% of the world’s population speaks a language other than English, we need more studies on writing and spelling in languages other than English. With this intention, we are presenting 6 papers on writing and spelling in different languages of different orthographic depth, from highly transparent orthographies like Spanish and Italian to highly opaque orthography like Cantonese.


2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Marizel Scheepers ◽  
Salomé Geertsema ◽  
Mia Le Roux ◽  
Marien Graham

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.


2016 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Tracy Probert ◽  
Mark De Vos

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


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