Phonics Instruction using Pseudowords for Success in Phonetic Decoding

Abstract

This study examined a Pseudoword Phonics Curriculum to determine if this form of instruction would increase students' decoding skills compared to typical real-word phonics instruction. In typical phonics instruction, children learn to decode familiar words which allow them to draw on their prior knowledge of how to pronounce the word and may detract from learning decoding skills. By using pseudowords during phonics instruction, students may learn more decoding skills because they are unfamiliar with the "words" and therefore cannot draw on memory for how to pronounce the word. It was hypothesized that students who learn phonics with pseudowords will learn more decoding skills and perform higher on a real-word assessment compared to students who learn phonics with real words.Students from two kindergarten classes participated in this study. An authorcreated word decoding assessment was used to determine the students' ability to decode words. The study was broken into three phases, each lasting one month. During Phase 1, both groups received phonics instruction using real words, which allowed for the exploration of baseline student growth trajectories and potential teacher effects. During v Phase 2, the experimental group received pseudoword phonics instruction while the control group continued real-word phonics instruction. During Phase 3, both groups were taught with real-word phonics instruction. Students were assessed on their decoding skills before and after each phase.Results from multiple regression and multi-level model analyses revealed a greater increase in decoding skills during the second and third phases of the study for students who received the pseudoword phonics instruction compared to students who received the real-word phonics instruction. This suggests that pseudoword phonics instruction improves decoding skills quicker than real-word phonics instruction. This also suggests that teaching decoding with pseudowords for one month can continue to improve decoding skills when children return to real-word phonics instruction. Teacher feedback suggests that confidence with reading increased for students who learned with pseudowords because they were less intimidated by the approach and viewed pseudoword phonics as a game that involved reading "silly" words. Implications of these results, limitations of this study, and areas for future research are discussed.

Blending Wheels

“…Research has demonstrated that isolated practice with both real words and pseudowords improves decoding accuracy and automaticity (Pullen & Lane, 2014). Cardenas (2009) examined the use of pseudowords in kindergarten phonics instruction, comparing it with instruction that used only real words. Her results indicated that students who received phonics instruction with pseudowords demonstrated greater improvement in decoding than students who received phonics instruction using only real words.…”

Syllable, Bigram, and Morphology-Driven Pseudoword Generation in Greek and a Protocol for Pseudoword Assessment

“…In a broader context, pseudowords have been extensively used in linguistic and psycholinguistic research. They are employed in phonetic decoding (Cardenas, 2009) and visual word recognition, including lexical decision and naming tasks (Balota et al, 2004). Furthermore, pseudowords help assess the credibility of learners' responses in non-native vocabulary tests (Meara, 2010;Keuleers et al, 2015;Arndt & Woore, 2018;Elgort & Warren, 2014, among others) or can function as stimuli to examine the mechanisms within cognitive models of reading (Coltheart et al, 2001;Harm & Seidenberg, 2004;Protopapas et al, 2006Protopapas et al, , 2007.…”

Using Character-Grams to Automatically Generate Pseudowords and How to Evaluate Them

“…Her research used pseudowords to evaluate children's knowledge of morphological rules, proving that children were capable of forming suitable endings, producing plurals, possessives, and past tense. Pseudowords are also utilised in phonetic decoding (Cardenas 2009), measuring pronunciation latency in learners (Schwartz 2013) and visual word recognition through lexical decision tasks and naming tasks (Balota et al 2007). Applied linguists and language testers have used pseudowords to assess the credibility of learner's responses in non-native vocabulary tests.…”