Tracking changes in the influence of broad auditory and specific phonological skills on beginning and intermediate reading performance

Lead Research Organisation: Aston University
Department Name: Sch of Life and Health Sciences

Abstract

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Description Learning to read is known to be dependent upon fundamental cognitive skills, in particular children's awareness of speech sounds (referred to as their phonological awareness) and their ability to hold verbal information in short-term memory (referred to as phonological memory). We have developed a distinctive approach to large-scale longitudinal research into children's language and literacy development. This approach capitalises on the power of statistical modelling to uncover causal relationships, whilst using carefully designed measures to extract key features of the underlying skills. Our approach contrasts with other longitudinal research in my field, in which broad constructs are measured using standardised tasks that tap into a range of skills. Although the mainstream methods can indicate which types of measures are most predictive of academic outcomes, this novel approach is key to uncovering the underlying skills that drive growth in language and literacy. Using statistical modelling of longitudinal data, we examined how fundamental cognitive skills predict later reading and also whether there are benefits of becoming literate on the development of these skills. We focussed on a critical time in a child's education their first 5 years at school and examined how reading, phonological awareness and phonological memory influence each other's development over time from the beginning of children's first year at school (age four) to age nine. Our findings emphasise the critical role of phonological awareness in predicting reading development, especially in the early school years and we have isolated the crucial predictive components of these tasks (their linguistic nature, the complexity of the linguistic items and the requirement of a verbal response, suggesting that phonological output processes are key). We also found a bi-directional relationship between children's oral language skills (specifically their ability to repeat nonwords- in the absence of any written text) and their reading development. As children become more proficient readers, this also impacts on their oral language skills: promoting phonemically detailed phonological representations as well as supporting the use of orthographic cues when repeating new words.
Exploitation Route Through external engagement aimed at non-academic audiences (see the Aston Literacy Project website), the following impacts on approaches to teaching and children's literacy are currently being achieved: (i) Impact on public policy - the Emerging Literacy Workstream: In early 2013, our project attracted the attention of a (then) primary school Deputy Headteacher and an Educational Psychologist. Together, in 2016, they used Shapiro's research to underpin a successful funding bid to the Highland Council, to develop the "The Emerging Literacy Workstream" within the Northern Alliance Regional Improvement Collaborative (a collaboration between eight local authorities across the north of Scotland). Their guidance for teachers was also influenced by this work- emphasising the imporance of checking and supporting phonological awareness skills. The Emerging Literacy Workstream now fills a palpable gap in teacher training in Scotland, by providing evidence-based training on literacy teaching that was lacking from teachers' initial training. As such, it is one of the key workstreams within The Northern Alliance Regional Improvement plan, 2018. This workstream then impacts on practitioners and enhanced performance, in terms of teaching phonological awareness, facilitating collaboration and career-long professional learning across 61% of the primary schools in the Northern Alliance geographical area (345 primary schools). This then has impact on child attainment: Children in Emerging Literacy schools (i.e. those engaging in the National Literacy Workstream) were more likely to achieve the required Early Level in every aspect of literacy. This work has also fed into the development of phonics courses for parents in England: Parents can play a key role in their child's reading development, but many parents lack the necessary skills. We have presented our research to the DfE and the National Family Learning Forum (NFLF). This provided the evidence base to co-develop phonics courses for parents with NFLF and the family learning team leads from 7 local authorities (Barnsley, Birmingham, Doncaster, York, North Lincolnshire, Newcastle, and Leicestershire) that prioritise phonological awareness as well as phonics skills.
Sectors Education
URL https://www2.aston.ac.uk/lhs/research/neurosciences/ccn/alp
 
Description Engaging with our participants and educational collaborators: We have created a publically-accessible project website that provides summaries of findings from the study and makes available reports of project outcomes (e.g., newsletters, posters, presentations, links to published reports). This includes reports designed specifically for teachers, parents and lay audiences. This is available here: www.aston.ac.uk/alp. We also sent reports directly to the schools who participate in the research after each data collection period. These reports included teacher feedback showing the distribution of standard scores in their class (an example teacher feedback report is available on our website). We also presented our findings to participating teachers at workshops hosted by participating schools in January 2017, plus gave a presentation at the inset day hosted by Aston University, for two schools who are part of the Aston Brooke Cooperative trust (presentation available on our website). Finally, teachers were informally kept up to date with the project through regular discussions with the PI and RF during their visits to the schools at each testing phase. Engaging non-academic users via public interest groups: The British Dyslexia Association (BDA) provides an important means of engaging with non-academic users of our research and we have presented our findings to the BDA in 2014, 2016 and will present our ongoing work related to this project in 2018. We are continuing to engage with other UK-based educational-interest groups, and most recently have been invited to present our work at a Scottish Insight event in Glasgow in January, 2018. Engaging non-academic users via public relations events: We engaged with children and their teachers at the Big Bang fair, March 2014 and Aston's Schools conference, Sep, 2012. Engaging non-academic users via teaching: An often underappreciated aspect of impact is the extent to which current research is disseminated to students through undergraduate and post-graduate teaching. We have engaged many undergraduate and postgraduate students in our research by offering Research Assistant placements with us, working with our team to collect data from children in schools and engage with teachers through helping to prepare our feedback reports. Some of our Research Assistants have gone on to PhDs in education-related fields, and others have gone into teaching. Continued activitity related to the application of our work: Through external engagement aimed at non-academic audiences (see the Aston Literacy Project website), the following impacts on approaches to teaching and children's literacy are currently being achieved: (i) Impact on public policy - the Emerging Literacy Workstream: In early 2013, our project attracted the attention of a (then) primary school Deputy Headteacher and an Educational Psychologist. Together, in 2016, they used Shapiro's research to underpin a successful funding bid to the Highland Council, to develop the "The Emerging Literacy Workstream" within the Northern Alliance Regional Improvement Collaborative (a collaboration between eight local authorities across the north of Scotland). Their guidance for teachers was also influenced by this work- emphasising the imporance of checking and supporting phonological awareness skills. The Emerging Literacy Workstream now fills a palpable gap in teacher training in Scotland, by providing evidence-based training on literacy teaching that was lacking from teachers' initial training. As such, it is one of the key workstreams within The Northern Alliance Regional Improvement plan, 2018. This workstream then impacts on practitioners and enhanced performance, in terms of teaching phonological awareness, facilitating collaboration and career-long professional learning across 61% of the primary schools in the Northern Alliance geographical area (345 primary schools). This then has impact on child attainment: Children in Emerging Literacy schools (i.e. those engaging in the National Literacy Workstream) were more likely to achieve the required Early Level in every aspect of literacy. This work has also fed into the development of phonics courses for parents in England: Parents can play a key role in their child's reading development, but many parents lack the necessary skills. We have presented our research to the DfE and the National Family Learning Forum (NFLF). This provided the evidence base to co-develop phonics courses for parents with NFLF and the family learning team leads from 7 local authorities (Barnsley, Birmingham, Doncaster, York, North Lincolnshire, Newcastle, and Leicestershire) that prioritise phonological awareness as well as phonics skills.
First Year Of Impact 2013
Sector Education
Impact Types Societal
 
Description Nuffield Foundation Grants for Research and Innovation
Amount £306,733 (GBP)
Funding ID EDO/43287 
Organisation Nuffield Foundation 
Sector Charity/Non Profit
Country United Kingdom
Start 03/2018 
End 05/2020