Comparison of Cognitive-linguistic Predictors of Reading Comprehension of English-Persian and

English-Arabic Bilinguals

Amir Sadeghi John Everatt

Brigid McNeill amir.sadeghi@pg.canterbury.ac.nz

Islamic Azad University of Damavand

The 4th Annual Educational Psychological Forum

Massey University, Albany, Auckland, NZ 22 & 23 November 2011

Knowledge of the skills underlying reading comprehension may help identify those who struggle with

literacy learning

Bilinguals (English-Persian or Arabic)

- Need to learn the skills in two languages/orthographies

- Need to understand both

(and influences across languages)

- English (well-researched)

- Persian & Arabic (similar orthographies)

Language Skills

READING

COMP

Word Decoding

English

Simple model of reading Gough & Tunmer, 1986

Reading Comprehension

Decoding Listening Comp.

Verbal Skills Vocabulary Syntax Semantics Pragmatics

grapheme phoneme

Phonology – literacy Relationship

• Associating written letters with sounds in language supports literacy acquisition

enables child to decode novel letter strings:

SCHOOL (SPLOOB)

(good strategy to support learning and as part of acquiring a sight vocabulary)

Influence of orthography

• However, the association between literacy and phonology varies across language background

how simple the association is between letters and sounds varies across languages/orthographies

Orthographic transparency More transparent

(symbol = sound

consistently)

Less transparent

(symbol – sound

correspondence

less reliable)

said – paid lint – pint have – cave tear peace/piece yacht

Arabic orthography

» Cursive script

» 28 letters and a number of diacritical marks – three of which represent short vowel sounds in the language

» Relatively transparent with short-vowel marks (vowelized)

» Highly opaque without marks

Persian orthography

» Cursive script

» 32 letters and a number of diacritical marks – some of which represent short vowel sounds in the language

» Relatively transparent with short-vowel marks (vowelized)

though several letters can stand for the same sound – problems for spelling

» Highly opaque without marks

Persian/Arabic language/orthography

Complex orthography

Alphabet Menu (the characters in red don’t exist in the Arabic orthography)

ح خ د ذ چت ث ج پآ ب

س ش ص ض ط ظ ژر ز

ل م ن و گع غ ف ق ک

ه ی

Complex orthography

• Isolated ن

• Final ـن

• Medial ـنـ

• Initial ن

Vowelization

Shallow when fully marked (vowelized) – used

for early learning – but not for older texts

e.g. The word مشک in Persian can be read

,mæ∫k/, meaning rubber water container/مَشک

or مُشک /mu∫k/, meaning perfume

Measures: Reading comprehension cloze and multiple-choice The cat ran after the … time mouse river Language competence listening comprehension and vocabulary e.g., TALL

Research

Research

Measures: Phonological awareness sound deletion task Say cat without the /k/ sound ‘/at/’ Phonological decoding non-word reading spab kint grob sploob fintal trimton

سیقالپا خاندوشی نیفارو مندرار

Research Measures: Orthographic skills word chain, matching words and non-words,

and orthographic choice monk munk nale nail Speed of processing rapid naming of letters, words, objects and

colours

PA

Language Skills

OK

READING

COMP

Word Decoding

LC

Vo

Persian (monolingual)

Sp (age/grade related)

PA

Language Skills

OK

READING

COMP

Word Decoding

LC

Vo

Arabic (monolingual)

M/S

Comparisons

Persian and Arabic

• Simple model of reading

(both languages – consistent with English)

• Importance of phonological processing

(both languages – consistent with English)

• Importance of early orthographic knowledge

(particularly for Persian/Arabic)

• Influence of morpho-syntactic processing

(Arabic)

PA (L2/1)

Language Skills

(L1 & L2)

READING

COMP

Word Decoding

(L2)

LC

Vo

Arabic (bilingual): L2-English

M/S GA

(L1 influence?)

Implications – monolingual data Assessments of Persian and Arabic need to

consider:

• Importance of language skills

• Importance of phonological processing

• Importance of orthographic knowledge early in acquisition of literacy skills – may be due to complexity of orthography

• Influences of morpho-syntactic processing and speed of processing – former may be due to Arabic language and latter to regularity of Persian text in early learning

Implications – bilingual data Assessments of second language acquisition

need to consider:

• Importance of language skills (both L1 and L2 may influence acquisition)

• Importance of phonological processing (L1 as well as L2 phonological skills may support L2 decoding – cross-language facilitation?)

• Influences of skills learnt in L1 on L2 acquisition (eg, morpho-syntactic processing)

• General ability factor

English – Persian

NEXT STEP

Developing the Biscriptal Model

Future Research

Children to be tested:

English-Persian bilingual children (N = 200) in NZ/Australia Focus on grades 2 to 5 approximately 1:1 female: male ratio Measures in Persian and English

Bilingual English-Persian

• Moved to New Zealand/Australia as immigrants or refugees

• Attend mainstream English schools

• Attend Persian literacy classes on weekends

• English is the dominant language • Parents interviews

• Observation

amir.sadeghi@pg.canterbury.ac.nz

Thank you