Title: Tara Chiatovich, Quad Chart 4/29/09 Leseaux, N.,
1Tara Chiatovich, Quad Chart 4/29/09Leseaux, N.,
Siegel, L. (2003). The develoment of reading in
children who speak English as a second language.
Developmental Psychology, 39, 1005-1019.
Purpose of the Study to examine the development of reading and the kindergarten predictors of subsequent reading ability in the context of a school district committed to a model of effective early reading programs for children with English as a first language (p. 1007). Method Sample 790 native English and 188 ESL children followed from K through 2nd grade entire Canadian school district, so wide range of SES ESL not correlated with SES. Skills measured Reading, phonological processing, lexical access (word retrieval), syntactic awareness, memory and spelling in both K and 2nd grade plus arithmetic in 2nd grade only Intervention District-wide reading acquisition program focusing on phonological awareness small group activities emphasizing links between sounds and symbols for 20 minutes 3-4 times a week all children participated in kindergarten those identified as at-risk in reading had targeted interventions in 1st grade as well. Graphic
Results K ESL children did worse than peers on measures of phonological awareness, syntactic awareness, lexical access, memory and spelling (but not on other measures). 2nd ESL children did better than peers on some measures of reading, all measures of spelling, and the measure of arithmetic but did worse than peers on the measure of syntactic awareness. Strengths Many many language measures making for a strong evaluation, entire urban school district included so fairly diverse sample, longitudinal. Weaknesses No control group, cannot determine causality, some measures different for K and for 2nd.