The Power of Children's Learning in their Reading Development
We examine how children become strong, fluent readers, including what they learn from reading itself.
Why is orthographic awareness important?
The ability to read and comprehend written text quickly and effectively, is central to full participation in society. Orthographic learning, which is the understanding of how written language works (e.g., letter patterns, spelling rules), is related to word reading. The underlying skills that allow for orthographic learning to happen have not been identified. ​The goal of our project is to identify the foundational skills that allow for orthographic learning in young children and how these connect to strong reading development.
Background
This study has two research objectives. Objective one is to identify the foundational skills that underlie orthographic learning in English-speaking children. Objective two is to connect these foundational skills and orthographic learning to reading development over time.
Over the course of a four-year longitudinal study, we are following the same participants from Grade Primary to Grade 3, collecting data annually on their reading and language skills to understand how children learn orthographic awareness and fluency. Children will complete a variety of language, cognitive, and reading activities designed to be fun and age appropriate, like choosing between letter patterns and reading words. Some activities will be conducted one-on-one with our research assistants while others will take place in small groups.
From 2025-2028, we are following kids from Primary to Grade 3. We conduct data collection in the winter and spring each year. Comparing results from Primary and Grade 1 will yield information on the short-term effects of literacy skills. By contrast, comparing results from Primary and Grade 3 will shed light on reading achievement as a whole and what early skills predict later success.
Thank you to our partners and funders!
Thank you to all the students, parents, teachers, and administrators who continue to make our work possible!
NSERC | Inter-University Research Network (IURN), Department of Education and Early Childhood Development | SSHRC | Dalhousie University