Metalinguistic Awareness and Reading Performance: A Cross Language Comparison

Abstract

The study examined two questions: (1) do the greater phonological awareness skills of billinguals affect reading performance; (2) to what extent do the orthographic characteristics of a language influence reading performance and how does this interact with the effects of phonological awareness. We estimated phonological metalinguistic abilities and reading measures in three groups of first graders: monolingual Hebrew speakers, bilingual Russian-Hebrew speakers, and Arabic-speaking children. We found that language experience affects phonological awareness, as both Russian-Hebrew bilinguals and the Arabic speakers achieved higher scores on metalinguistic tests than Hebrew speakers. Orthography affected reading measures and their correlation with phonological abilitites. Children reading Hebrew showed better text reading ability and significant correlations between phonological awareness and reading scores. Children reading Arabic showed a slight advantage in single word and nonword reading over the two Hebrew reading groups, and very weak relationships between phonological abilities and reading performance. We conclude that native Arabic speakers have more difficulty in processing Arabic orthography than Hebrew monolinguals and bilinguals have in processing Hebrew orthography, and suggest that this is due to the additional visual complexity of Arabic orthography.

The Complex Nature of Text Reading Difficulties: The Case of Bilingual Children

“…In this context, phonological awareness of the first language was found to predict word identification and decoding skills in the second language (Cisero & Royer, 1995). Another research has found a relationship between the acquisition of phonological decoding in the mother tongue and reading acquisition in the second language (Ibrahim, Eviatar, & Aharon-Peretz, 2007). Phonological awareness was found to be a significant predicting factor of reading achievements in both languages, regardless of the nature or type of the mother tongue (Muter & Diethelm, 2001;Quiroga, Lemos-Britton, Mostafapour, Abbott, & Berninger, 2002).…”

“…2) This is an extremely important research in the light of the findings of Ibrahim et al (2007) regarding differences in reading speed in Arabic and Hebrew among Arabic and Hebrew speakers (Ibrahim, Eviatar, & Aharon-Peretz, 2007). Ibrahim et al (2007) examined the utilization of the good phonological awareness among children Arabic mother tongue speakers compared to uni-lingual speakers of other languages (Hebrew speakers) and bi-lingual speakers (Hebrew and Russian speakers) (Eviatar & Ibrahim, 2001). They found that in reading, Arabic speakers do not utilize this advantage and that their performance in their language (Arabic) is lower (in terms of reading time and accuracy) than other lingual groups.…”

“…However, the opposite finding has been reported: reading acquisition in Arabic is slower than in Hebrew. In order to examine this question, we measured the relationship between phonological abilities and various reading measures in first grade in children learning to read Hebrew or Arabic (Ibrahim et al, 2007). First graders were given a series of tests of phonological awareness and a vocabulary test, and given grade level texts to read.…”

“…Additional research is required to examine the effects of diglossia on Hebrew and Arabic speaking children, who live together in a unique setting of a bi-lingual school, mainly in acquiring reading in Arabic. 2) This is an extremely important research in the light of the findings of Ibrahim et al (2007) regarding differences in reading speed in Arabic and Hebrew among Arabic and Hebrew speakers (Ibrahim, Eviatar, & Aharon-Peretz, 2007). Ibrahim et al (2007) examined the utilization of the good phonological awareness among children Arabic mother tongue speakers compared to uni-lingual speakers of other languages (Hebrew speakers) and bi-lingual speakers (Hebrew and Russian speakers) (Eviatar & Ibrahim, 2001).…”

Electronic Reading and Writing in Spoken and Written Arabic: A Case Study

“…Similar findings have emerged when comparing literacy achievements within Israeli society between Hebrew and Arabic speakers. Among Arabic speakers in Israel, some evidence indicates that reading rates are lower when reading their native Arabic (L1) as compared to reading non-native (L2) Hebrew (Ibrahim, Eviatar & Aharon-Peretz, 2007). Many researchers (e.g., Myhill, 2009) have suggested that some of these difficulties are attributable to the so-called "diglossia" phenomenon in Arabic (see below), first described by Ferguson (1959) to refer to the existence of a high-prestige literary language and a low-prestige spoken dialect(s).…”