Young Persian Speakers’L2 Phonological Decoding Abilities & Their L2 Reading Comprehension Proficiency

نوع مقاله : نمایه

نویسنده

دانشگاه یزد

10.29252/kavosh.2004.2305

چکیده

One of the determinants of reading comprehension is phonological decoding ability (Perfetti, 1985 & Ehri, 1995). The ability to pronounce the printed word, if not sufficient appears to be necessary to reading comprehension. The mastery of grapheme phoneme conversion has been reaffirmed by L1 researchers (Gough, 1984; Stanovich, 1991). However, compared with cognitive and metacognitive processes, few studies have been devoted to phonological decoding in L2.
In order to test the question that lower level reading-skill groups in L2 may be hindered by slow decoding, it was designed to explore whether there are differences in word-decoding speed between four groups of ESL readers at different levels of reading proficiency skill. So they were asked to sort pairs of words into two groups depending on whether the words in the pair rhymed. The rhymed pairs of words were of two different kinds: (1) visually-similar rhymes (ride-hide) and (2) visually-dissimilar rhymes (side- cried). The result indicated that the difference between the groups was highly significant F(3,36)= 4.45, p 0.05 which means in both types of material the groups have performed differently. It implies all groups have been involved, probably consciously, in grapheme phoneme conversion, though, based on their reading proficiency levels, the higher levels have been faster than the lower ones to carry out the task. The reason behind this finding may be that unconscious or automatic processing of sound decoding has not yet been achieved. As Mclaughlin (1990) and Grabe (1991) view development of automatically in word identification skill critical to fluent reading, the study has some implications for L2 reading education.

کلیدواژه‌ها


عنوان مقاله [English]

Young Persian Speakers’L2 Phonological Decoding Abilities & Their L2 Reading Comprehension Proficiency

نویسنده [English]

  • Ali Mohammad Fazilatfar
Yazd University
چکیده [English]

One of the determinants of reading comprehension is phonological decoding ability (Perfetti, 1985 & Ehri, 1995). The ability to pronounce the printed word, if not sufficient appears to be necessary to reading comprehension. The mastery of grapheme phoneme conversion has been reaffirmed by L1 researchers (Gough, 1984; Stanovich, 1991). However, compared with cognitive and metacognitive processes, few studies have been devoted to phonological decoding in L2.
In order to test the question that lower level reading-skill groups in L2 may be hindered by slow decoding, it was designed to explore whether there are differences in word-decoding speed between four groups of ESL readers at different levels of reading proficiency skill. So they were asked to sort pairs of words into two groups depending on whether the words in the pair rhymed. The rhymed pairs of words were of two different kinds: (1) visually-similar rhymes (ride-hide) and (2) visually-dissimilar rhymes (side- cried). The result indicated that the difference between the groups was highly significant F(3,36)= 4.45, p < 0.01. The effect of the of materials exceeds highly the critical value F(1,36)=56.98 p < 0.0001. The f-ratio for the interaction of reading skill levels and materials on overall gain scores is not significant, F(3,36)= 1.11, P>0.05 which means in both types of material the groups have performed differently. It implies all groups have been involved, probably consciously, in grapheme phoneme conversion, though, based on their reading proficiency levels, the higher levels have been faster than the lower ones to carry out the task. The reason behind this finding may be that unconscious or automatic processing of sound decoding has not yet been achieved. As Mclaughlin (1990) and Grabe (1991) view development of automatically in word identification skill critical to fluent reading, the study has some implications for L2 reading education.

کلیدواژه‌ها [English]

  • Phonological decoding
  • comprehension
  • skill levels
  • pronounce