phonological learning studies

• Error analysis of beginning readers learning letter-sounds: Wimmer& Hummer (1989) asked beginning reader to read words andpseudowords:


  For words, errors were usually non-words, but preserved initialletter - i.e. at least partially phonologically correct, and littleevidence of visual-strategy.Pseudowords were read quite well - these words should not beable to be read if a visual strategy is used because they havenever been seen.
• Ehri & Wilce (1985)’s ‘phonetic-cue’ reading

  1. evidence that children are able touse their knowledge of letternames/sounds to link to lettersrequires child to haverepresentation of sound units(phonological awareness)b) letter-sound knowledge

  
• Phonological Awareness? (PA)


  knowledge that words are made up from separate units of sound within a word - there are 3 levels

  • PA aware children area able to identify & manipulate units of sound within a word

  
• How is PA measured?

  tasks that require some operation (e.g., identifying, comparing,separating, combining, generating) on sounds at different levels, e.g.rhyme recognition
• How does PA develop?

  in general, progression:

  
  

  large units -> small units

  syllables > onsets/rimes > phonemes

  
  

  tasks

  identification > manipulation

  
  

  blending > segmentation

  
  

  phonological skills have enduring ability to predict later reading ability and inability (VERY robust finding)

  
  

  
  

  performance on PA tasks at age 4 (pre-readers) predict reading at age 10 (Stuart & Masterson, 1992)