In this research project, I examined phonological awareness interventions (PAIs) in primary French Immersion classrooms. In detail, I discussed current research on the importance of phonological awareness (PA) as a foundation for literacy skills and the transferability of these pre-literacy skills across languages. In a focus group setting, I invited primary French Immersion teachers to share their knowledge and understanding of PA as well as share effective interventions to teach this pre-literacy skill to second language learners. Subsequently, I delivered a questionnaire to teachers asking them to rate the listed interventions for effectiveness and frequency of application. Results indicated that teachers had a varying degree of knowledge of PA, and therefore, PAIs. PAIs identified in this study match the research of current PAI and addressed the "big ideas" of literacy such as phonemic awareness, fluency, comprehension, vocabulary and the alphabetic principle. PAIs that were highest rated in frequency and effectiveness included building words on mini-chalkboards, cutting sentence strips, and identifying rhymes in stories and poems. --Leaf ii.
Orthographic and phonological processing skills have been shown to vary as a function of reader skill (Stanovich & West, Reading Research Quarterly, 24, 402-433, 1989; Unsworth & Pexman, Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 56A, 63-81, 2003). One variable known to contribute to differences between readers of higher and lower skill is amount of print exposure: higher skilled readers read more often than lower skilled readers, and their increased print exposure is associated with faster responding to words and nonwords in lexical decision tasks. The present experiments examined the effect of print exposure on the word frequency effect and neighborhood size effect. We conclude that the different outcomes reported in previous studies (Chateau & Jared, Memory and Cognition, 28, 143-153, 2000; Lewellen, Goldinger, Pisoni, & Greene, Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 122, 316-330, 1993) were due to the type of nonwords used in the lexical decision task (regular nonwords versus pseudohomophones). Our results are explained in terms of differences in the reliance on orthographic and phonological information between readers of higher and lower print exposure.; Orthographic and phonological processing skills have been shown to vary as a function of reader skill (Stanovich & West, Reading Research Quarterly, 24, 402–433, 1989; Unsworth & Pexman, Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 56A, 63–81, 2003). One variable known to contribute to differences between readers of higher and lower skill is amount of print exposure: higher skilled readers read more often than lower skilled readers, and their increased print exposure is associated with faster responding to words and nonwords in lexical decision tasks. The present experiments examined the effect of print exposure on the word frequency effect and neighborhood size effect. We conclude that the different outcomes reported in previous studies (Chateau & Jared, Memory and Cognition, 28, 143–153, 2000; Lewellen, Goldinger, Pisoni, & Greene, Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 122, 316–330, 1993) were due to the type of nonwords used in the lexical decision task (regular nonwords versus pseudohomophones). Our results are explained in terms of differences in the reliance on orthographic and phonological information between readers of higher and lower print exposure.; Orthographic and phonological processing skills have been shown to vary as a function of reader skill (Stanovich & West, Reading Research Quarterly, 24, 402-433, 1989; Unsworth & Pexman, Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 56A, 63-81, 2003). One variable known to contribute to differences between readers of higher and lower skill is amount of print exposure: higher skilled readers read more often than lower skilled readers, and their increased print exposure is associated with faster responding to words and nonwords in lexical decision tasks. The present experiments examined the effect of print exposure on the word frequency effect and neighborhood size effect. We conclude that the different outcomes reported in previous studies (Chateau & Jared, Memory and Cognition, 28, 143-153, 2000; Lewellen, Goldinger, Pisoni, & Greene, Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 122, 316-330, 1993) were due to the type of nonwords used in the lexical decision task (regular nonwords versus pseudohomophones). Our results are explained in terms of differences in the reliance on orthographic and phonological information between readers of higher and lower print exposure.
