The Relationship of Logical Reasoning Ability, Oral Language Comprehension, and Home Experiences to Preschool Children's Print Awareness

Abstract

The study examined the relationship of logical reasoning ability, oral language comprehension, and home experiences to preschoolers' print awareness. Measures of print awareness were: letter naming, visual discrimination, auditory discrimination, and two measures which assessed concepts about print (knowledge about the purposes of print in the environment and knowledge about the processes involved in using print). Sixty three-, four-, and five-year-olds were tested on the measures of print awareness, logical reasoning ability, and lexical and grammatical comprehension of oral language. Information on home experiences was obtained by surveying parents on their own reading habits and the reading-related activities in which they participated with their children. Three measures—logical reasoning ability, lexical comprehension, and home teaching activites—provided the best overall model in accounting for differences in children's performances across the print awareness measures.