The Impact Of Preschool Phonological Awareness On The Reading Ability Of Primary School Children: A Five-year Follow-up Stud

Background:Reading ability is an important social skill that we must have.Kindergarten to lower primary school is an important period for children’s reading ability development.phonological awareness is one of the most important factors affecting reading.Besides,orthographic awareness,morpheme awareness and rapid naming are also important cognitive factors.However,there are few studies explored through long-term follow-up studies to investigate how preschoolers’ phonological awareness affects the reading ability of the lower grades of primary school via these cognitive factors.A little study suggest that Chinese character recognition can also affect speech cognitive skills.If this relationship holds,preschool children’s phonological awareness may affect the reading ability of lower primary school students through the multiple mediating effects of Chinese character recognition in the late preschool period and speech cognitive skills in primary school.In this study,the longitudinal tracking method was used to study the influence of kindergarten children’s phonological awareness in different periods on the reading ability of lower primary school students,and to explore the underlying mechanism.Methods:A five-year follow-up study was conducted in kindergartens affiliated to Shaanxi Normal University.Measurements were performed at four time points:The first year of kindergarten K1(127),the second year of kindergarten K2(114),the third year of kindergarten K3(111)and primary school grade 2 P2(74).At each stage of kindergarten,children’s syllable awareness,phonemic onset awareness and rime awareness were measured,and Chinese character recognition task was added at K3.In P2,orthographic awareness,rapid naming,phoneme awareness and Chinese character recognition.The first study explored the relationship between preschool children’s phonological awareness at different stages and K3 literacy,P2 cognitive ability and P2 Chinese character recognition,and explored the internal mechanism of the influence of K1 phonological awareness on P2 Chinese character recognition.Based on the findings of study one,study two and study three explored the internal mechanism of the influence of K2 and K3 phonological awareness on P2 Chinese character recognition through mediation model.Results:(1)K1 phonological awareness can not predict P2 Chinese character recognition,while K2 and K3 phonological awareness can predict K3 Chinese character recognition and P2 Chinese character recognition,and K3 Chinese character recognition can predict P2 Chinese character recognition;K2 and K3 phonological awareness can predict P2 orthographic awareness and P2 rapid naming,respectively.Moreover,those P2 orthographic awareness and rapid naming can predict P2 Chinese character recognition.In addition,K3 Chinese character recognition can predict P2 orthographic awareness.(2)K2 phonological awareness influences P2 Chinese character recognition through the chain mediation of K3 Chinese character recognition and P2 orthographic awareness,including two intermediary paths:first,K2 phonological awareness→K3 Chinese character recognition→P2 reading ability;second,K2 phonological awareness→K3 Chinese character recognition→P2 orthographic awareness→P2 reading ability.(3)K3 phonological awareness affects P2 Chinese character recognition through the parallel mediation of K3 Chinese character recognition and P2 rapid naming.Conclusion:The prediction of P2 Chinese character recognition and its mechanism varies in different periods of kindergarten:K1 cannot predict P2 Chinese character recognition;K2 can affect P2 children’s reading ability through the chain mediation of intermediary variables K3 Chinese character recognition and P2 orthographic awareness;K3 phonological awareness can affect P2 children’s reading ability through the parallel mediation of intermediary variables K3 and P2.