2.1: Building the Foundation for Literacy - Oral Language

“The child begins to perceive the world not only through his eyes but also through his speech.” – Lev Vygotsky

Children need to know so much more than the ABCs in order to read books in English (Schickedanz & Collins, 2013). Many caregivers and teachers tend to focus too much attention on letter names and letter sounds when it comes to teaching their children to read. Even in countries where they do not speak English as their first language, they often start with teaching the ABCs to their young children if they want to teach them English as a second language. However, knowing the names and sounds of the letters is just part of learning how to read in English. Let’s say children successfully decode the word don, a fairly easy word to decode. It is entirely possible that they do not understand what it means, as it is not a frequently used word among young children. The word don, which means “to put on,” is known by fewer than 40 percent of American children by the end of grade six in the United States (Biemiller, 2010). The bottom line of reading is comprehension (Shea, 2016), understanding what you read. The most important foundation for reading is oral language development because it can help children make meaning out of reading in English.

The Emergent Literacy Stage

You might observe children pretending to read, even before they start formal reading instruction. Perhaps they might hold a favorite book like Hush Little Baby by Sylvia Long upside down while making up their own story. Before children are able to say recognizable words, they might hold a book just like you do while cooing or babbling. These pretend behaviors with books are considered by educators to be part of emergent literacy. Sulzby and Teale, who first used the term emergent literacy, explained the concept:

“Emergent literacy is concerned with the earliest phases of literacy development, the period between birth and the time when children read and write conventionally. The term emergent literacy signals a belief that, in a literate society, young children – even 1- and 2-year-olds – are in the process of becoming literate” (1996, p.728).

Therefore, you can observe the process of children’s literacy emerging, including the aspects of oral-language development, phonological awareness, the print concept, and alphabet knowledge.

Before reading is taught formally, children have to know the language that they are trying to decipher.

Oral language is not just knowing the meaning of words. It involves the grammar that combines the words correctly. It means having appropriate language for different social contexts, such as school or a party. Let alone understanding the meaning of a word, just being able to say its smallest part, like the phoneme /m/ in Mom, is something that takes a newborn baby a long time, hearing it repeated by caregivers, siblings, and neighbors. It is a long journey to acquire the sounds used for the first language and learn to distinguish them from foreign-language or animal sounds. Oral language is an important foundation for future reading development.

Important terms

These are terms you will see used throughout this text.

• Alphabet Knowledge: The knowledge of letter names and sounds. It involves recognizing, writing, and identifying the names and sounds of the letters in the English alphabet.
• Print Concepts: The awareness of how print works to convey a message
• Phonological Awareness: The awareness of how various sound structures of speech work in a language
• Oral Language Development: The development of skills and knowledge used for listening and speaking. It is an important foundation for reading comprehension and writing.
• Phonemic Awareness: A subcategory of phonological awareness which focuses on the individual phonemes
• Phonics: An instructional approach that teaches the letter-sound relations
• Fluency: The ability to read with accuracy, automaticity, natural prosody, and stamina
• Vocabulary: The words that are understood and used
• Comprehension: The understanding of what is read by decoding and meaning-making

The Importance of Oral Language

• The development of strong oral language skills during the preschool years creates an important foundation for later achievement in reading, especially reading comprehension. (Storch & Whitehurst, 2002)
• If children don’t develop strong language skills during the preschool years they are less likely to be successful beginning readers and they can continue to lag behind their peers throughout elementary school and beyond (Juel,1988).
• Children who are behind their peers in language development are at risk for later reading difficulties (Catts, Fey, Tomblin, & Zhang, 2002)
• The knowledge a child has about vocabulary is strongly related to reading proficiency and overall academic success. (Beck, McKeown,& Kucan, 2002)
• Research has suggested there is a relationship between vocabulary and phonological awareness. Children who “know’” a word or have a word in their oral language vocabulary may be able to analyze the sounds in that word more easily than if they do not know or have never heard the word.
• Vocabulary knowledge helps children decode words or map spoken sounds to words in print. When a child reads words they already have in their oral vocabulary, it will be easier for them to sound out, read, and understand them, and they will be able to comprehend what they are reading. When words are NOT in child’s oral language vocabulary, they will have trouble reading the words, and they most likely will not comprehend the words. (National Reading Panel, 2000)

References

Storch SA, Whitehurst GJ. Oral language and code-related precursors to reading: evidence from a longitudinal structural model. Dev Psychol. 2002 Nov;38(6):934-47. PMID: 12428705.

Catts, H. W., Fey, M. E., Tomblin, J. B., & Zhang, X. (2002). A Longitudinal Investigation of Reading Outcomes in Children With Language Impairments. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research. https://doi.org/10924388004500061142

Beck, Isabel & Mckeown, Margaret & Kucan, Linda. (2002). Bringing Words to Life: Robust Vocabulary Instruction.

Juel, C. (1988). Learning to read and write: A longitudinal study of 54 children from first through fourth grades. Journal of Educational Psychology, 80(4), 437–447. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-0663.80.4.437