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Part of
Developmental Perspectives in Written Language and Literacy: In honor of Ludo Verhoeven
Edited by Eliane Segers and Paul van den Broek
[Not in series 206] 2017
► pp. 219–236

A comparison of phonological awareness and morphological awareness in reading Chinese across two linguistic contexts

| | McMaster University, Hamilton, Canada
| | Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, University of Toronto, Toronto, Canada
|
| | Wilfrid Laurier University, Waterloo, Canada
This longitudinal study tested whether contributions of phonological awareness and morphological awareness to Chinese vocabulary and character reading measured one year later were similar for monolingual Chinese-speaking children in China and Chinese-English bilingual children in Canada. Participants included 79 Canadian and 93 Chinese children in kindergarten or Grade 1 at Time 1. Hierarchical regression models revealed that across groups, morphological awareness accounted for similar portions of significant variance in vocabulary and character reading. However, phonological awareness showed stronger relations to character reading among the monolinguals than the bilinguals. The findings highlight both the universal and context-dependent aspects of Chinese language and literacy development.
Keywords: morphological awareness, phonological awareness, vocabulary, character reading, Chinese, linguistic context
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
    • 1.1Phonological awareness and morphological awareness in reading Chinese
    • 1.2Development of phonological awareness and morphological awareness in bilingual children
    • 1.3The present study
  • 2.Method
    • 2.1Participants
    • 2.2Measures
    • 2.3Non-verbal reasoning
    • 2.4Phonological awareness
    • 2.5Morphological awareness
    • 2.6Vocabulary
    • 2.7Character reading
    • 2.8Procedure
  • 3.Results
    • 3.1Means and correlations
    • 3.2The role of phonological awareness in vocabulary and character reading
    • 3.3The role of morphological awareness in vocabulary and character reading
  • 4.Discussion
    • 4.1Similarities and differences in the relations between the metalinguistic and literacy skills
    • 4.2Development of Chinese metalinguistic skills
    • 4.3Conclusion
  • References
Published online: 21 December 2017
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/z.206.14lam
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