This paper describes a small-scale study that examined the ways four elementary teachers in the United States scaffolded the literacy of students differently through interruptions. One thousand four hundred and ninety-eight interruptions were identified and coded in the study. Findings show that teachers' interruption patterns frequently…

This study explored the effects of achievement goals on English as a foreign language (EFL) college students' reading strategy use and reading comprehension from the perspective of multiple goals. Fifty-seven participants verbalised their thoughts while reading an English expository essay. They also completed assessments on their reading goal…

This study examined whether 10-12-year-old children use two reading strategies to aid their text comprehension: (1) distinguishing between important and unimportant words; and (2) resolving anaphoric references. Of interest was the question to what extent use of these reading strategies was predictive of reading comprehension skill over and above…

The present study examined the possibility that spelling fulfils a self-teaching function in the acquisition of orthographic knowledge because, like decoding, it requires close attention to letter order and identity as well as to word-specific spelling-sound mapping. We hypothesised that: (i) spelling would lead to significant (i.e. above-chance)…

In this study the effect of repeated reading on the acquisition of orthographic knowledge was examined. Acquisition of orthographic knowledge was assessed by the effect of word length on reading speed. We predicted that the effect of length in a set of words and pseudowords would decrease after the repeated reading of these (pseudo)words. The…

As part of a longitudinal twin study of literacy and language, we conducted a behaviour-genetic analysis of orthographic learning, spelling and decoding in Grade 2 children (225 identical and 214 fraternal twin pairs) in the United States and Australia. Each variable showed significant genetic and unique environment influences. Multivariate…

This study compared orthographic and semantic aspects of word learning in children who differed in reading comprehension skill. Poor comprehenders and controls matched for age (9-10 years), nonverbal ability and decoding skill were trained to pronounce 20 visually presented nonwords, 10 in a consistent way and 10 in an inconsistent way. They then…

Does unexpectedly poor spelling in adults result from inferior visual sequential memory? In one experiment, unexpectedly poor spellers performed significantly worse than better spellers in the immediate reproduction of sequences of visual symbols, but in a second experiment, the effect was not replicated. Poor spellers were also no worse at the…

Skilled readers were trained to recognise either the oral (n=44) or visual form (n=40) of a set of 32 novel words (oral and visual instantiation, respectively). Training involved learning the "meanings" for the instantiated words and was followed by a visual lexical decision task in which the instantiated words were mixed with real English words…

This paper presents a treatment study with a developmental dysgraphic girl, KM, and addresses the mechanisms by which orthographic learning of spelling rules might occur. Before treatment, KM's spelling of words and nonwords was impaired. Analyses of spelling errors indicated poor knowledge of sound-to-letter correspondences. Treatment focused on…

Recent years have brought about rapid advances in our understanding of reading and how it develops, particularly in relation to the importance of alphabetic coding skills. However, much less has been known about the transition from alphabetic decoding to the rapid and automatic orthographic recognition of words, which is the hallmark of skilled…

Forty-eight adults were trained on monosyllabic pseudowords and their meanings and then tested in vocal spelling. The orthographic inconsistency of the rime (e.g. "orn, awn" for "glorn") and the number of learning trials affected accuracy and response latency in the vocal spelling test. In addition, orthographic typicality as assessed by neighbour…

We investigate whether orthographic processes influence the identification and encoding of letter position within letter strings. To minimise word-specific effects, we adopt a visual letter search task that requires participants to identify a cued letter target among a random five-letter string. Using this paradigm, previous studies have shown…

This study investigated trajectories of Korean children's growth in the awareness of four phonological units--"syllable," "body," "rime" and "phoneme"--over time, by following a sample of 215 children over a period of 15 months, beginning at their first year of preschool and collecting four waves of data. Much of the existing research suggests…

This study investigated how constructive activities are involved when Chinese students are performing reading tasks that require deeper levels of understanding. Forty students from Grade 5 (19 boys and 21 girls), and 42 students from Grade 6 (20 boys and 22 girls) participated in this study. To reveal the children's constructive processes in…