Abstract
This study assessed the efficacy of PASSI (Promoting the Achievement of Sound-Sign Integration), an intervention to improve children's conceptual knowledge of the Italian writing system in kindergarten, which is an emergent literacy predictor of reading and spelling acquisition focused on letter-speech sound integration. PASSI implements an embedded-explicit approach in which teachers target specific subskills (reflection on the graphic, symbolic and phonological aspect of written signs) and emphasize children's contextualized interactions with oral and written language. One hundred fifty-nine Italian children participated in this study. Six teachers (and their three respective classes) were randomly assigned to the experimental group, and six teachers were assigned to the control group. All children were tested on the invented spelling of words and numbers, knowledge of the alphabet, orthographic awareness, and drawing twice, before and after the intervention. Children's visual-motor integration skills were also assessed as a control variable. The data were analyzed through the complex samples general linear model (GLM) approach. The results confirmed the efficacy of PASSI in promoting children's conceptual knowledge of the writing system and related emergent literacy skills. Theoretical and educational implications of the results are presented and discussed.
Highlights
This study assessed the efficacy of an intervention to improve children’s conceptual knowledge of the Italian writing system in kindergarten
This study examined the efficacy of PASSI in children’s performances in the invented spelling of words and numbers, orthographic awareness and knowledge of letters in the Italian language, with children’s visual-motor integration included as a control variable
The children were able to recognize an average of six letters, the knowledge of letter performances was characterized by great variance
Summary
This study assessed the efficacy of an intervention to improve children’s conceptual knowledge of the Italian writing system in kindergarten. Children’s conceptual knowledge of the writing system are generally assessed through an invented spelling task, in which children create letter-speech sound integrations that correspond to their level of knowledge of the writing system This factor integrates phonological awareness with grapho-motor skills (Berninger et al, 2008) and visual attention (Germano et al, 2014). Studies have contributed to the reconsideration of phonological awareness as the main predictor of literacy acquisition and brought to light multicomponent constructs, such as children’s emergent conceptual knowledge of the writing system (Ouellette and Sénéchal, 2017; Pinto et al, 2017). This construct can be considered the emergent antecedent of the integration process that characterizes formal spelling
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