Phonemic Awareness Contributes to Text Reading Fluency: Evidence From Eye Movements

This research was supported by an Early Career Investigator award to the first author from Central Michigan University. We thank Courtney Chamberlain, Hannah Faleer, Madison Kloss, Kristin Willis, and Michelle Young for helping with data collection, Debra Poole for providing the participant data base, Jiye Shen for programming support, and Melissa Farrall for commenting on a previous version of this article.

Abstract.

Although phonemic awareness is a known predictor of early decoding and word recognition, less is known about relationships between phonemic awareness and text reading fluency. This longitudinal study is the first to investigate this relationship by measuring eye movements during picture matching tasks and during silent sentence reading. Time spent looking at the correct target during phonemic awareness and receptive spelling tasks gauged the efficiency of phonological and orthographic processes. Children's eye movements during sentence reading provided a direct measure of silent reading fluency for comprehended text. Results indicate that children who processed the phonemic awareness targets more slowly in Grade 2 tended to be slower readers in Grade 3. Processing difficulty during a receptive spelling task was related to reading fluency within Grade 2. Findings suggest that inefficient phonemic processing contributes to poor silent reading fluency after second grade.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Jane Ashby

Jane Ashby, PhD, is a tenured assistant professor in the Psychology Department at Central Michigan University, who holds graduate degrees in education (Harvard) and psychology (University of Massachusetts, Amherst). She monitors eye movements during silent reading and other tasks in order to examine the development of reading fluency in Grades 1–3, the cognitive foundations of rapid naming performance, and individual differences in figurative language processing.

Heather Dix

Heather Dix is a doctoral student in the school psychology program at Central Michigan University.

Morgan Bontrager

Morgan Bontrager is an undergraduate research assistant who manages Jane Ashby's Reading Laboratory at Central Michigan University. She is a psychology major and a past president of the university's chapter of the International Honor Society for Psychology (Psi Chi).

Rajarshi Dey

Rajarshi Dey, PhD, is the director of the Statistical Consulting Center and an assistant professor in the Department of Mathematics at Central Michigan University. He received his PhD in statistics from Kansas State University. His research interests include nonparametric statistics, linear models, and distribution theory.

Ana Archer

Ana Archer managed Jane Ashby's reading laboratory while completing her undergraduate degree in psychology and neuroscience at Central Michigan University in 2012.