Abstract
Ninety-four Mainland Chinese children in the second and third years of kindergarten (mean age = 65 months, SD = 6.94) were tested on Pinyin letter-name knowledge, invented Pinyin spelling, general copying skills of unfamiliar print (in Korean, Hebrew and Vietnamese, ultimately combined to create a pure copying factor), delayed copying of characters, nonverbal reasoning, vocabulary knowledge, speeded number-naming, syllable deletion, and morphological awareness in order to examine unique correlates of beginning Chinese word reading and writing, which were also tested. With age, kindergarten level, and nonverbal reasoning statistically controlled, morphological awareness, speeded naming, and Pinyin letter-name knowledge uniquely explained Chinese word reading, whereas both the pure copying factor and delayed copying independently explained 11 and 5 % variance in Chinese word writing, respectively. Findings suggest a somewhat independent trajectory of developing word reading and writing skills in very young Chinese children and highlight the potential importance of both print-dependent and print-independent copying skills for the development of early word writing skill in Chinese.
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Notes
The word “writing” in Chinese characters means writing from memory, as a dictation task. The terms “dictation” and “writing” will be used interchangeably in this paper because we think both are approximately reflective of the processes that Chinese children go through to write characters and words.
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Acknowledgments
This study was supported by RGC Grant 451811 from the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region. We thank all the children, their parents and the teachers, for their participation. We also thank Hiu Chung Chan, Mei Ho Lam, and Kai Yu for their work in preparing the testing materials and in data collection.
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Appendices: Examples of children’s copying samples
Appendices: Examples of children’s copying samples
Appendix 1: Delayed copying of Chinese character
沿 | 柄 | 远 | 茄 | 弯 |
Five characters
Appendix 2: Korean copying task
Appendix 3: Hebrew copying task
Appendix 4: Vietnamese copying task
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Wang, Y., McBride-Chang, C. & Chan, S.F. Correlates of Chinese kindergarteners’ word reading and writing: the unique role of copying skills?. Read Writ 27, 1281–1302 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11145-013-9486-8
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11145-013-9486-8