Abstract
The work is aimed at studying the relations between different levels of phonological awareness and early reading ability. Ten different metaphonological tasks as well as a reading (syllables and word decoding) test were administered to kindergarteners and first graders. The correlations between metaphonological abilities and reading were highly significant for the kindergarteners. In the tasks involving sensitivity to phonological similarities, correlations were weak and nonsignificant for the first graders. A principal components analysis shows two components at first grade: sensitivity to phonological similarities and segmental awareness. Reading was related only to the latter. The differential performance between prereaders and readers within the group of kindergarten shows that sensitivity to phonological similarities and initial isolation of segments takes precedence over alphabetic reading. Segmental awareness, however, does not develop outside the learning of the alphabetical code as the evidence provided by results in deleting, counting and reversal tasks suggests. All children who had developed segmental awareness were able to read but, interestingly enough, some good readers performed poorly in some of the segmental awareness tasks (i.e. deleting of initial phoneme).
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Alegría, J., Pignot, E. & Morais, J. (1982). Phonetic analysis of speech and memory codes in beginning readers,Memory & Cognition 10: 451–456.
Alegría, J., Morais J. & D'Alimonte, G. (in prep.). The development of speech segmentation abilities and reading acquisition in a whole word setting.
Backman, J. (1983). The role of psycholinguistic skills in reading acquisition: A look at early readers,Reading Research Quarterly 18: 466–479.
Bradley, L. & Bryant, P. E. (1983). Categorizing sounds and learning to read: A causal connection,Nature 301: 419–421.
Bradley, L. & Bryant, P. E. (1985).Rhyme and Reason in Reading and Spelling. I.A.R.L.D. Monographs, No. 1. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.
Brady, S. A. & Shankweiler, D. P. (1991).Phonological Processes in Literacy. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Content, A., Kolinsky, R., Morais, J. & Bertelson, P. (1986). Phonetic segmentation in prereaders: Effect of corrective information,Journal of Experimental Child Psychology 42: 49–72.
Goswami, U. & Bryant, P. (1990).Phonological Skills and Learning to Read. Hillsdal, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Lenchner, L., Gerber, M. M. & Routh, D. K. (1990). Phonological awareness tasks as predictors of decoding ability: Beyond segmentation,Journal of Learning Disabilities 23: 240–247.
Liberman, I. Y., Shankweiler, D., Fisher, F. & Carter, B. (1974). Explicit syllable and phoneme segmentation in the young child,Journal of Experimental Child Psychology 18: 201–212.
Lundberg, I. (1991). Phonemic Awareness can be developed without reading instruction. In: S. A. Brady & D. P. Shankweiler (eds.),Phonological Processes in Literacy (pp. 47–53). Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Lundberg, I., Frost, J. & Petersen, O. (1988). Effects of an extensive program for stimulating phonological awareness in preschool children,Reading Research Quarterly 23: 263–284.
Lundberg, I., Olofsson, A. and Wall, S. (1980). Reading and spelling skills in the first school year predicted from phonemic awareness skills in kindergarten,Scandinavian Journal of Psychology 21: 159–173.
Morais, J. (1991a). Constraints on the development of phonemic awareness. In: S. A. Brady & D. P. Shankweiler (eds.),Phonological Processes in Literacy (pp. 5–27). Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Morais, J. (1991b). Phonological awareness: A bridge between language and literacy. In: D. J. Sawyer & B. J. Fox (eds.),Phonological Awareness in Reading (pp. 31–71). New York: Springer Verlag.
Morais, J., Alegría, J. & Content, A. (1987). The relationship between segmental analysis and alphabetic literacy: An interactive view,Cahiers de Psychologie Cognitive 7: 415–438.
Morais, J., Cary, L., Alegría, J. & Bertelson, P. (1979). Does awareness of speech as a sequence of phones arise spontaneously?Cognition 7: 323–331.
Nesdale, A. R., Herriman, M. L. & Tunmer, W. E. (1984). Phonological awareness in children. In: W. E. Tunmer, C. Pratt & M. L. Herriman (eds.),Metalinguistic Awareness in Children: Theory, Research and Implications (pp. 56–72). New York: Springer Verlag.
Perfetti, C. A., Beck, I., Bell, L. C. & Hughes, C. (1987). Phonemic knowledge and learning to read are reciprocal: A longitudinal study of first grade children,Merrill-Palmer Quarterly 33: 283–319.
Read, C., Zhang, Y., Nie, H. & Ding, B. (1986). The ability to manipulate speech sounds depends on knowing alphabetic writing,Cognition 24: 31–44.
Stanovich, K., Cunninghan, A. E. & Cramer, B. B. (1984). Assessing phonological awareness in kindergarten children: Issues of task comparability,Journal of Experimental Child Psychology 38: 175–190.
Treiman, R. & Zukowski, A. (1991). Levels of phonological awareness. In: S. A. Brady & D. P. Shankweiler (eds.),Phonological Awareness in Literacy (pp. 67–83). Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Tunmer, W. E. & Nesdale, A. R. (1985). Phonemic segmentation skill and begining reading,Journal of Educational Psychology 77: 417–427.
Valtin, R. (1984). Awareness of features and functions of language. In: J. Downing & R. Valtin (eds.),Language Awareness and Learning to Read (pp. 227–260). New York: Springer Verlag.
Yopp, H. K. (1988). The validity and reliability of phonemic awareness test,Reading Research Quarterly 23: 159–177.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Carrillo, M. Development of phonological awareness and reading acquisition. Read Writ 6, 279–298 (1994). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01027086
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01027086