Oral Vocabulary Research Articles

The influence of syntactic knowledge on reading comprehension varies as a function of oral vocabulary in Spanish‐speaking children

BackgroundReading comprehension is a complex process influenced by many factors. However, the abilities that are known to influence reading comprehension may not contribute equally for children with different levels of oral language.AimsHere we examined the relationship of two factors known to influence reading comprehension (morphology and syntax) in a group of children who varied in their levels of oral vocabulary.MethodTwo hundred seventy‐three typically developing Spanish‐speaking fourth graders were assessed on non‐verbal intelligence, word and pseudoword reading, oral vocabulary, morphological awareness and syntax, along with reading comprehension ability. Standardised oral language scores within this group ranged from the first to the 99th percentile. Mediated multiple regression with moderation was used to assess (1) whether the influence of oral vocabulary on reading comprehension was mediated by decoding, morphology or syntax and (2) whether the effects of syntax on reading comprehension varied as a function of oral vocabulary levels.ResultsThere was a direct positive relationship between vocabulary and reading comprehension, and this was mediated by word reading and syntax, but not by pseudoword reading or morphology. Furthermore, the relation between syntax and reading comprehension was moderated by oral vocabulary such that the strength of this relationship diminished as oral vocabulary levels increased.ConclusionsThese findings suggest that longitudinal research is necessary to explore the possibility that a syntax intervention might be beneficial for readers with low oral vocabulary.

Parent-Implemented Oral Vocabulary Intervention for Children With Down Syndrome

Young children with Down syndrome (DS) often demonstrate impaired oral vocabulary development; however, few intervention studies have focused on this population. One promising method to improve the oral vocabulary of young children with DS may be to train their parents to intervene at home. In this study, we used tele-education methods (e.g., videoconferences, email) to coach parents to implement an adapted version of Down Syndrome LanguagePlus (DSL+). Four children with DS (ages 5–6 years) participated in the multiple probe across behaviors (i.e., stories) single-case research design study. Increasing trends during baseline and data variability precluded confirmation of a functional relationship; however, results indicated that all participants increased their scores on mastery measures of targeted vocabulary. Three of the four parents implemented DSL+ with high fidelity and responded favorably to social validity interviews.

Elementary Teachers’ Intervention Fidelity in Relation to Reading and Vocabulary Outcomes for Students at Risk for Reading-Related Disabilities

Teachers’ implementation of differentiated supplemental instruction is critical to help students with or at risk for reading-related disabilities acquire early reading and vocabulary skills. This study represents an initial investigation of whether classroom teachers’ intervention fidelity (exposure, adherence, and quality) of targeted reading instruction (TRI, formerly called targeted reading intervention), a professional development program with embedded student intervention and weekly webcam literacy coaching support, was related to spring reading and oral vocabulary gains for students at risk for reading-related disabilities. The study also examined whether teachers’ years of participation in TRI (1 year vs. 2 years) moderated associations between intervention fidelity and students’ reading and oral vocabulary outcomes. Findings suggested that teachers’ adherence to TRI strategies was directly associated with students’ vocabulary gains as well as word reading skills for teachers in their second year of participation. Furthermore, when teachers provided students with more TRI exposure during their second year of participation, students made greater gains in word reading and reading comprehension.

The contributions of separate pinyin skills and oral vocabulary to Chinese word reading of U.S. Mandarin immersion third graders

The present study aimed to examine the contributions of two separate Pinyin skills and oral vocabulary to Chinese word reading of 70 third graders in a U.S. Mandarin Immersion program where Pinyin was introduced at Grade 3. Hierarchical regression analyses showed that Pinyin initial-final spelling—the skill to spell Chinese syllables using Pinyin letters—and oral vocabulary were uniquely associated with Chinese word reading, after accounting for the effects of phonological awareness and the other Pinyin skill of tone identification. The variance in Chinese word reading explained by tone identification was fully accounted for by oral vocabulary, Pinyin initial–final spelling, and phonological awareness, suggesting that tone identification might involve both phonology- and meaning-related processes. Oral vocabulary and tone identification explained more shared variance in Chinese word reading than the two code-related skills of phonological awareness and Pinyin initial-final spelling. The importance of meaning-related skills in learning the deep orthography of Chinese characters for Chinese L2 young learners is discussed.

Punching through the barrier

Abstract This paper aims to investigate how productive oral vocabulary development can be promoted by focusing on word stress patterns. The Rhythmic Fight Club (RFC) pronunciation technique has been used in numerous ESL/EFL classrooms, but its effect on the L2 vocabulary development of learners has yet to be investigated. The present study focused on adult ESL learners and tested a four-stage learning cycle aimed at developing productive oral vocabulary. This paper focuses on findings related to one aspect of that learning cycle which used the RFC to draw learner attention to word stress patterns in order to control productive output. Findings reveal that repetition of target words whilst making a gesture helped to enhance the learners’ productive output accordingly. The paper concludes that kinaesthetic/tactile classroom teaching techniques such as the RFC can help learners to develop productive oral vocabulary by reconceptualising their perception of English speech rhythm.

Examining the reading-related competencies of struggling adult readers: nuances across reading comprehension assessments and performance levels

Research with school-age readers suggests that the contributions of reading and language skills vary across reading comprehension assessments and proficiency levels. With a sample of 168 struggling adult readers, we estimated the explanatory effects of decoding, oral vocabulary, listening comprehension, fluency, background knowledge, and inferencing across three reading comprehension tests and across low, average, and high levels of performance. OLS regression models accounted for 66% of the variance in WJ Passage Comprehension scores with all competencies except listening comprehension as significant predictors; 43% of the variance in RAPID Reading Comprehension scores with decoding and listening comprehension as significant predictors; and 31% of the variance in RISE Reading Comprehension scores with decoding as a significant predictor. Quantile regression models and between-quantile slope comparisons showed that the effects of some predictors on reading comprehension varied across performance levels on one or more tests. Implications for instruction, assessment, and future research are discussed.

Oral vocabulary affects children’s orthographic learning in Chinese

While research has established a close relationship between children’s oral vocabulary and reading ability in Chinese, the nature of this relationship is not clear. This study aims to examine if vocabulary knowledge of Chinese words facilitates learning novel orthographic forms during independent reading. We also investigate whether such oral vocabulary is to complement phonological decoding, which has been considered the primary underpinning of orthographic learning, or whether it makes a unique contribution to the acquisition of novel orthographic representations in Chinese. Data from two studies (Li et al. in Cognition 176:184–194, 2018; Li et al. in Sci Stud Read. https://doi.org/10.1080/10888438.2020.1781863 ) were re-analysed (total N = 164). In these studies, children learned the oral vocabulary of some novel Chinese words and subsequently saw their written forms as pseudocharacters in short stories. The phonetic regularity of the pseudocharacters was manipulated such that half of them could be reliably decoded via the phonetic radical (regular) and the other half could not (irregular). The results showed that oral vocabulary learning was significantly associated with orthographic learning and pseudocharacter reading in natural text. Importantly, item-specific oral vocabulary knowledge predicted the success of orthographic learning and reading accuracy of both regular and irregular pseudocharacters. These results provide evidence that oral vocabulary makes a unique contribution to children’s orthographic learning in Chinese during independent reading.

Improving children’s oral vocabulary with a dynamic intervention programme

ABSTRACT Objective: Two agendas guided this study. The first is to report on a dynamic intervention programme that utilizes key developmental domains and strategies, such as emotional expression opportunities, motor activity, learning in groups, playful learning, and shared reading. The second is to explore the possibility that dynamic intervention can improve vocabulary growth in a low socioeconomic status pre-K cohort and to examine whether the intervention can mitigate the impact of negative factors that impede vocabulary growth. Method: To explore the programme’s impact, 62 children were recruited (28 girls and 34 boys) from seven different kindergartens in northern Israel. Their vocabulary skills were gauged pre- and post-intervention, and a MANOVA test was implemented to investigate the programme’s contribution and its potential to mediate impeding factors. Results: The results indicate that the intervention improved the children’s vocabulary scope in all domains and moderated the negative impact of lower socioeconomic status, low print exposure, and sibship size. Conclusion: We conclude by discussing how the dynamic intervention programme can address children’s needs and what learning strategies might further enhance their vocabulary development.

Predicting Literacy Development of Orally Trained Deaf and Hard of Hearing Children in Taiwan: A Two-Year Longitudinal Study.

Twenty-eight deaf and hard of hearing Chinese-speaking public school children in Taiwan were tested on literacy achievement tasks at the end of kindergarten (T1), first grade (T2), and second grade (T3) over 2 years. After nonverbal IQ and hearing threshold were controlled for, the results revealed that early oral vocabulary and print awareness tested in kindergarten were related to word recognition in first grade. Moreover, receptive oral vocabulary (T1) was related to reading achievement in first and second grade. Phoneme (onset-rime) blending (T1) was associated with reading achievement in first grade, but not second grade. While onset-rime blending made more unique contributions to picture-book reading comprehension (T2), oral receptive vocabulary contributed uniquely to reading comprehension in T3 more than onset-rime blending. The time (in minutes) per week parents spent in shared book reading with their child was moderately related to reading comprehension at T3.

Unpacking the Simple View of Reading for Struggling Adult Readers

The Simple View of Reading (SVR), which posits that reading comprehension is the product of decoding and linguistic comprehension, has been studied extensively with school-age readers. However, little is known about the intricacies of the SVR for adults who struggle with reading. This study addresses notable gaps in this literature, including the dimensionality of linguistic comprehension, the interaction between the two SVR components, and the relative contributions of components across different reading proficiency levels. With a sample of 392 struggling adult readers, confirmatory factor analyses indicated that the linguistic comprehension component encompasses the highly related yet separable constructs of oral vocabulary and listening comprehension. Structural equation modeling showed significant main effects of decoding and listening comprehension, but not oral vocabulary, on reading comprehension. In addition, the interaction among the SVR components did not uniquely contribute to variance in reading comprehension. Quantile regression models demonstrated that the unique effects of the SVR components were relatively stable in magnitude across different levels of reading comprehension performance. Implications for instruction and future research are discussed.

Reading comprehension gains in a differentiated reading intervention in Spanish based on the Simple View

This experimental study aimed to influence reading comprehension skills through the development of one or both components of the Simple View of Reading (decoding and listening comprehension), by using a differentiated instruction approach. Reading comprehension skill gains were compared in an intervention group versus a control, after the delivery of a program designed to target one or both of such components. Fifty-four children from two 1st grade classrooms in a public school in Mexico were screened for difficulties in decoding and listening comprehension at the end of the school year. At the beginning of 2nd grade, 27 students identified with difficulties were randomly assigned to either an intervention ( n = 14) or a control group ( n = 13). Students selected for the targeted intervention attended the sessions aimed at their specific needs: five students with poor decoding only received the Phonological and Orthographic Awareness sessions of the intervention (9 sessions); seven students with poor listening comprehension only attended the Oral Vocabulary sessions (5 sessions); two students with mixed difficulties attended the full program (14 sessions). A 2 × 2 mixed analysis of variance showed that the interaction between the Time and Group variables had a significant effect, i.e. students in the intervention group had significantly higher scores in the post-test evaluation with respect to their baseline and compared to the growth observed in the control group. Results are discussed concerning their implications for teaching practices and for the use of strategies that target reading specific difficulties in students using both oral and written language.

Assessing second language oral proficiency development with holistic and analytic scales

The present study discusses how a group of experienced raters use different types of scales to assess the development of oral proficiency in English as a second language (L2). Raters assigned rates to speech samples first using a holistic scale (CEFR, 2018) and then assigning rates for pronunciation, vocabulary, grammar and fluency performance using individual scales. The speech samples were recorded by five Brazilians. There were two data collection sessions, with the second one occurring 7-8 months after the first one. The results indicate high levels of agreement among raters for all scales. Furthermore, the raters detected changes in speakers’ performance in four out of five scales: L2 oral proficiency, vocabulary, grammar, and fluency, and these differences in rates across time were significant for oral proficiency, vocabulary, and fluency. Thus, the different types of scale allow detecting L2 oral proficiency development.

B1 düzeyi ders materyallerinin söz varlığının ve B1 düzeyi öğrencilerin yazılı söz varlığının çeşitli değişkenler açısından derlem tabanlı incelenmesi

Yabancı dil eğitimi açısından derlem tabanlı çalışmalarının önemi giderek artmaktadır. Derlem tabanlı çalışmalar aracılığı ile dil eğitiminde öğretilen kelimelerin öncelikleri uluslararası kıstaslar çerçevesinde belirlenmektedir. Yazılı ve sözlü birçok tabakadan oluşan derlemler ve alt derlemler hem öğretici hem de öğrenci için sürecin verimliliğini artırmaktadır. Yabancı dil olarak Türkçe öğretiminde genellikle ders materyallerinin söz varlığı üzerine odaklanılmaktadır. Öğrenen bireylerin söz varlığı da bu süreçte araştırmacılar için üzerinde durulması gereken alanlardandır. Yabancı dil olarak Türkçe öğrenen bireylerin yazılı ya da sözlü söz varlığı hem mevcut durumu görmek için hem de sıklık listeleri ile kıyaslamalar yapabilmek için gözetilmektedir. Ders kitapları bünyesinde yer alan metinler öğretim programı ve öğretici için çatı konumundadır. Bu çalışmada da Yabancı dil olarak Türkçe öğrenen B1 düzeyi öğrencilerin yazılı söz varlığı, derste kullanılan materyallerin okuma metinlerinin söz varlığı ve Aksan vd. (2017) derlem tabanlı çalışması araştırmanın odak noktasını oluşturmaktadır. Araştırma çerçevesinde 6 haftalık B1 kuru süresince 21 öğrenciye 7 farklı kompozisyon yazdırılmıştır. Akabinde öğrencilerin yazılı söz varlığının belirlenmesi için bu kompozisyonlar bilgisayar ortamına aktarılmış; kullanılan ders kitabındaki okuma metinleri ilgili aşamalardan geçirilerek söz varlığının belirlenmesinde kullanılacak yazılım için uygun hale getirilmiştir. Ders kitabının söz varlığı ve öğrencilerin yazılı anlatımlarının söz varlığında en sık kullanılan 500 kelime, sözcük türleri bakımından en sık kullanılan 500 kelime Aksan’ın (2017) çalışması ile kıyaslanmış, benzerlik düzeyleri tespit edilmiştir. En sık kullanılan kelimeler bakımından Aksan (2017) derlem tabanlı çalışması ile ders materyalinin söz varlığının benzerlik düzeyi bakımından istenen ideal düzeyde olmadığı saptanmıştır.

Video Cartoons and Task-Induced Involvement: Effects to Pupils’ L2 Incidental Literacy Acquisition

While most studies that explored children’s incidental literacy acquisition focused on input from written text, this quantitative-qualitative study investigated the effects of using audio-visual input through close-captioned Aesop’s Fables cartoons from PinkFong and Task-Induced Involvement (n=6 eight-year old pupils). Wilcoxon Signed Rank Test reveals that there is a significant difference in the pretest, immediate posttest and delayed posttests scores after the intervention as shown in the 90%-95% confidence level. This study also examines quantitatively the interconnectedness of the four areas of children’s literacy skills: vocabulary, oral vocabulary and pronunciation, orthographic skill and comprehension after watching cartoons and engaging in tasks. Findings reveal a high correlation between the four literacy skills reflected as 95% confidence intervals. These findings reveal that incidental literacy acquisition is approached holistictically: the acquisition of one skill leads to the acquisition of the other literacy skills.

The Effectiveness of Online Dialogic Storytelling on Vocabulary Skills of Hard of Hearing Children

Objectives: The present study aimed to investigate the effectiveness of an online dialogic storytelling program on vocabulary skills (picture, relative, and oral vocabulary skills) of hard of hearing children. Methods: In this experimental study with pre-test-post-test and a control group design, 34 mothers of hard of hearing children participated. Children’s ages range from 4 to 6 years and they were selected from aural rehabilitation centers in Tehran. They were assigned randomly into the experimental (n=17) and control (n=17) groups that were matched for age and sex. Before starting the online dialogic storytelling program, the children took the Test Of Language Development (TOLD-P: 3). The online dialogic storytelling was done 20 minutes a day, 3 days a week for 12 weeks for mothers and their children. After completion of the program, the language development test was administered to both groups as the post-test. The data were analyzed by 1-way Analysis of Covariance (ANCOVA). Results: The results showed that the vocabulary skills, picture, relative and oral vocabulary of the experimental group significantly improved after participating in the online dialogic storytelling sessions (P<0.001) Discussion: Storytelling is one of the most effective ways to improve the vocabulary skills of hearing-impaired children and it seems that storytelling needs to be included in their rehabilitation programs.

Oral language teaching in English as First Additional Language at the Foundation Phase: A case study of changing practice

Background: Despite South Africa’s huge investment in professional development, there is not a lot of research that shows that teachers change their teaching practices by attending formal interventions. This article focuses on English as First Additional Language (EFAL) and explores how one Grade 2 teacher changed her practice of oral language teaching while enrolled for an Advanced Certificate in Teaching (ACT) programme. The programme was offered to Foundation Phase teachers to improve their teaching knowledge and ultimately change their teaching practices. Objectives: The article explores one teacher’s oral language teaching and use of teacher resources in a township school. The purpose is to understand how her instructional practices changed or did not change during the 18 months while she was enrolled with the ACT programme. Method: Data were collected over 18 months by observing six video-recorded literacy lessons, corroborated with interviews and field notes. These were analysed using principles of teaching EFAL espoused in the programme’s intended curriculum. Results: The two exemplars offered demonstrate a gradual shift in teaching of oral language and use of resources by the end of the programme. The teacher code-switched appropriately most of the time and adequately used various strategies. She created opportunities to develop learners’ oral vocabulary; however, explicit sentence building was absent. Findings further revealed that the teacher’s engagement with many collaborative professional development activities, school support, together with her goal-achieving character, contributed to instructional changes. Conclusion: This study highlights that there are a number of other factors, such as the school context, the teacher’s motivation and other informal learning opportunities that support teacher learning from a formal professional development intervention. It also advocates for more robust studies on how a teacher’s practices change as a result of formal professional development opportunities.

Tracking the evolution of orthographic expectancies over building visual experience

Literate children can generate expectations about the spellings of newly learned words that they have not yet seen in print. These initial spelling expectations, or orthographic skeletons, have previously been observed at the first orthographic exposure to known spoken words. Here, we asked what happens to the orthographic skeleton over repeated visual exposures. Children in Grade 4 (N = 38) were taught the pronunciations and meanings of one set of 16 novel words, whereas another set were untrained. Spellings of half the items were predictable from their phonology (e.g., nesh), whereas the other half were less predictable (e.g., koyb). Trained and untrained items were subsequently shown in print, embedded in sentences, and eye movements were monitored as children silently read all items over three exposures. A larger effect of spelling predictability for orally trained items compared with untrained items was observed at the first and second orthographic exposures, consistent with the notion that oral vocabulary knowledge had facilitated the formation of spelling expectations. By the third orthographic exposure, this interaction was no longer significant, suggesting that visual experience had begun to update children’s spelling expectations. Delayed follow-up testing revealed that when visual exposure was equated, oral training provided a strong persisting benefit to children’s written word recognition. Findings suggest that visual exposure can alter children’s developing orthographic representations and that this process can be captured dynamically as children read novel words over repeated visual exposures.

The roles of decoding and vocabulary in Chinese reading development: Evidence from a 3-year longitudinal study.

Decoding and vocabulary are two essential abilities to reading comprehension. Investigating the roles of decoding and vocabulary in Chinese reading development can not only provide empirical evidence to enrich the current reading theories but also have implications for educational practice. To examine the developing importance of decoding and vocabulary to reading comprehension and the reciprocal relationship between decoding and vocabulary across the reading development. A total of 186 Chinese children were followed from grade 1 to grade 3 (aged 6.5 to 8.5years). Participants' decoding, vocabulary, and reading comprehension abilities were measured once a year for three years. Hierarchical multiple regression analyses were conducted to obtain the unique contributions of decoding and vocabulary to reading comprehension in the different grades. A cross-lagged structural equation model was used to explore the reciprocal relationship between decoding and vocabulary over the three years. Decoding and vocabulary explained nearly 40% of the variance to reading comprehension across grades, and the unique contribution of decoding decreased over the grades (from 29% to 8%) while that of vocabulary increased (from 3% to 9%). Moreover, vocabulary always predicted decoding from grade 1, but decoding predicted later vocabulary only started in grade 2. Decoding skills are important to reading comprehension in the early learn-to-read grades. However, vocabulary becomes more critical for reading comprehension in later grades. Larger oral vocabularies promote the development of decoding skills, and vice versa.

The influence of sleep on language production modalities in preschool children with Down syndrome.

Evidence suggests that sleep may relate to oral language production in children with Down syndrome. However, these children are capable of using complex referential gestures as a compensation strategy for problems with oral production, and those with a greater productive oral vocabulary have less gestural vocabulary. The goal of this study was to explore whether sleep quality relates to oral and gestural production modalities in children with Down syndrome. We evaluated 36 preschool children with and without Down syndrome, paired by chronological age and gender, with similar sociodemographic backgrounds, using actigraphy to measure sleep behaviour and the Communicative Development Inventory for Down syndrome to measure vocabulary. Children with Down syndrome with better sleep efficiency showed more oral production but less gestural production. These results highlight the importance of sleep quality to language learning in children with Down syndrome.

Learning Vocabulary Through Listening: The Role of Vocabulary Knowledge and Listening Proficiency

AbstractThis study explored the impact of preexisting vocabulary knowledge (PVK) and listening proficiency on the vocabulary learning through listening of 137 Chinese learners of English, when provided with three types of oral vocabulary explanations—second language (L2), codeswitching (CS), and contrastive focus‐on‐form (CFoF)—and when no explanations (NE) were provided (extending Zhang & Graham, 2019). Listening proficiency was a more important factor influencing vocabulary learning through aural input than PVK was, with most notable gains for learners with high listening proficiency and low PVK. The CFoF approach was the most helpful for learners regardless of their PVK and listening proficiency, whereas the NE approach was the least helpful. Moreover, comparing just the CS and L2 groups, the CS approach was more helpful for lower PVK learners and for more proficient listeners than the L2 approach was. Higher PVK learners and less proficient listeners, however, benefited more from the L2 approach than from the CS approach. The study highlights the complex interplay of vocabulary knowledge, listening proficiency, and instructional conditions, factors useful to bear in mind when planning activities to enhance vocabulary learning through listening.