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Predicting bilingual Spanish–English children's phonological awareness abilities from their preschool English and Spanish oral language
Author(s) -
Scarpino Shelley E.,
Lawrence Frank R.,
Davison Megan D.,
Hammer Carol S.
Publication year - 2011
Publication title -
journal of research in reading
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.077
H-Index - 51
eISSN - 1467-9817
pISSN - 0141-0423
DOI - 10.1111/j.1467-9817.2010.01488.x
Subject(s) - phonological awareness , psychology , vocabulary , longitudinal study , vocabulary development , neuroscience of multilingualism , english vocabulary , linguistics , phonology , developmental psychology , teaching method , literacy , mathematics education , pedagogy , philosophy , neuroscience , statistics , mathematics
This longitudinal study investigated the relationship between oral language abilities and phonological awareness in 85 typically developing, Spanish–English preschool children (average age in preschool was 3 years, 9 months). Receptive language skills in Spanish and English were assessed in the autumn and spring during the children's 2 years in Head Start for a total of four measurement occasions. Phonological awareness was assessed during the spring of children's kindergarten year. Results indicated that English receptive vocabulary at the end of preschool predicted English phonological awareness abilities in kindergarten, whereas Spanish vocabulary was observed to have a negative predictive relationship with children's English phonological awareness abilities. However, after controlling for English vocabulary, Spanish vocabulary no longer had an effect on English phonological awareness. Broad receptive language abilities in English and Spanish did not predict later English phonological awareness skills.