Effects of a phonological awareness program on English reading and spelling among Hong Kong Chinese ESL children.

Carol K K Chan,Linda S Siegel,Susanna S S Yeung

doi:10.1007/s11145-012-9383-6

Abstract

This study investigated the effects of a 12-week language-enriched phonological awareness instruction on 76 Hong Kong young children who were learning English as a second language. The children were assigned randomly to receive the instruction on phonological awareness skills embedded in vocabulary learning activities or comparison instruction which consisted of vocabulary learning and writing tasks but no direct instruction in phonological awareness skills. They were tested on receptive and expressive vocabulary, phonological awareness at the syllable, rhyme and phoneme levels, reading, and spelling in English before and after the program implementation. The results indicated that children who received the phonological awareness instruction performed significantly better than the comparison group on English word reading, spelling, phonological awareness at all levels and expressive vocabulary on the posttest when age, general intelligence and the pretest scores were controlled statistically. The findings suggest that phonological awareness instruction embedded in vocabulary learning activities might be beneficial to kindergarteners learning English as a second language.

Highlights

Phonological awareness, the conscious ability to identify and manipulate speech sounds mentally, is a very important literacy skill that children have to acquire in early years (e.g., Whitehurst & Lonigan, 1998)
This study investigated the effects of a 12-week language-enriched phonological awareness instruction on 76 Hong Kong young children who were learning English as a second language
The results indicated that children who received the phonological awareness instruction performed significantly better than the comparison group on English word reading, spelling, phonological awareness at all levels and expressive vocabulary on the posttest when age, general intelligence and the pretest scores were controlled statistically

Summary

Introduction

Phonological awareness, the conscious ability to identify and manipulate speech sounds mentally, is a very important literacy skill that children have to acquire in early years (e.g., Whitehurst & Lonigan, 1998). It has been demonstrated repeatedly as a good predictor of later reading outcomes (Blachman, 1997; Muter & Snowling, 1998; Wagner, Torgesen, & Rashotte, 1994). Children who lag behind in developing phonological awareness skills are likely to be at-risk for reading difficulties (Bradley & Bryant, 1983; Torgesen, Wagner, & Rashotte, 1997) Do these findings for monolingual English speakers generalize to ESL children who have a first language (L1) significantly different from English? The aim of this study was to examine whether phonological awareness instruction helps to promote phonological awareness and reading skills of kindergarten Chinese ESL learners

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