Phonological Awareness Development: Kindergarten Children’s Segmentation

and Representation of Consonant Blends

Krystal Werfel and C. Melanie Schuele Vanderbilt University

ABSTRACT

This study explored segmentation and representation of initial (e.g., skate) and final (e.g., jump) consonant blends in a developmental spelling measure. Fifty-seven kindergarten children completed a 26-word developmental spelling measure three times in kindergarten (six-week intervals). Responses were analyzed for logical representation of speech sounds to describe developmental change and differential accuracy across blend types. Kindergarten children showed emerging ability to segment and represent consonant blends and were differentially successful depending on linguistic and phonetic features of blends. Implications for teaching phonemic segmentation and spelling are discussed.

INTRODUCTION

There is general agreement that children must have a foundation of phonemic awareness, particularly phonemic segmentation, upon which to build early decoding and spelling skills (e.g., Adams, 1990). One aspect of phonemic segmentation that has received limited attention is segmentation of consonant blends. Segmentation of singleton consonants and vowels (e.g., CVC, CV, VC) does not automatically generalize to segmentation of blends (Bruck & Treiman, 1990).

Children initially represent only the first sound of word initial blends (e.g., “sop” for stop; Bruck & Treiman, 1990) and the second sound of word final blends (e.g., “fat” for fast; Treiman et al., 1995).

TWO ACCOUNTS

• Marcel (1980) suggested blends segmentation is a linguistic ability that involves a single insight into “blendness.”

• Read (1975; 1986) suggested that children are differentially successful with blends based solely on the phonetic properties of the phonemes within the blend.

Treiman’s (1991) exploration of blends in first graders indicated no differential success across blends, with the exception of final nasal blends. However, by first grade, children may have acquired a level of proficiency that obscured differences across blends observed beginning at emergence of skill.

A preliminary examination of 439 kindergartners’ spellings of four blend words (skate, plum, float, treat) suggested that phonetic features influence children’s ability to segment each phoneme (Spencer, Schuele, & Werfel, 2007).

The purpose of this study was to describe the development of kindergarten children's segmentation and representation of blends and to evaluate the extent to which linguistic and phonetic features influence blend segmentation.

DISCUSSION

REFERENCES

Segmentation and representation of consonant blends is a distinct, more difficult skill than segmentation of singletons. Kindergarten children show an emerging ability to segment and represent consonant blends. The ability to segment and represent consonant blends varies during this early period of emergence depending on linguistic and phonetic features of blends (e.g., word position, blend class, homorganicity). Kindergarten children display random variability in their ability to segment and represent consonant blends.

Adams, M.J. (1990). Beginning to read: Thinking and learning about print. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

Anthony, J.L, Lonigan, C.J., Driscoll, K., Phillips, B.M., & Burgess, S.R. (2003). Phonological sensitivity: A quasi-parallel progression of word structure units and cognitive operations. Reading Research Quarterly, 38, 470-487.Bruck, M., & Treiman, R. (1990). Phonological awareness and spelling in normal children and dyslexics: The case of initial consonant clusters. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 50, 156-178.Johnston, F., Invernizzi, M., & Juel, C. (1998). Book buddies: Guidelines for

volunteer tutors of emergent and early readers. New York: Guilford Press.Marcel, T. (1980). Phonological awareness and phonological representation: Investigation of a specific spelling problem. In U. Frith (Ed.), Cognitive processes in spelling (pp. 373-403). New York: Academic Press.Read, C. (1975). Children's categorization of speech sounds in English. Urbana, Ill: National Council of Teachers of English. Read, C. (1986). Children's creative spelling. International library of psychology. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul. Spencer, E.J., Schuele, C.M., & Werfel, K.L. (2007, November). Kindergarten children’s phonological awareness: Representation of consonant blends. Poster presented at the Annual Convention of the American Speech-Language- Hearing Association, Boston, MA.Treiman, R. (1991). Children’s spelling errors on syllable-initial consonant clusters. Journal of Educational Psychology, 83, 346-360.Treiman, R., Zukowski, A., & Richmond-Welty, E. (1995). What happened to the "n" of sink? Children's spellings of final consonant clusters. Cognition, 55, 1-38.

Author Contact: krystal.l.werfel@vanderbilt.edu

This study was supported by a Students Preparing for Academic and Research Careers (SPARC) Award (2007-08) awarded to the first author by ASHA and by a Preparation of Leadership Personnel grant (H325D080075; PI: Schuele), US Department of Education.

METHOD

PARTICIPANTS

• 57 kindergarten children (29 boys)

• M age = 72 mos., SD = 4 mos.• Two non-public schools in Nashville, TN

• Seven classrooms• All children spoke English as native language

PROCEDURES

Children participated in three assessments at six-week intervals across approximately four months in the latter part of the kindergarten school year.

The focus of this study was a developmental spelling measure that included 18 CCVC and 8 CVCC real words. Three lists of words were randomly administered.

Developmental spelling responses were scored for logical representations of speech sounds. For example, acceptable responses included developmental speech errors (e.g., w for r in bread) and voicing errors (e.g., d for t in stop). A scoring guide was developed similar to Johnston et al. (1998).

EXAMPLE SCORING

RESULTS RESULTS

Time 1 (0 wk)

Time 2 (6 wk)

Time 3 (12 wk)

Developmental SpellingLetter Sounds Initial SoundsWord Reading

Developmental SpellingLetter Sounds Initial Sounds

Developmental SpellingLetter Sounds Initial SoundsWord Reading

QUESTION 1: Do initial consonant blends emerge before final consonant blends?

RESULTS: At Time 1 and Time 3, there was no difference in performance on initial and final consonant blends. At Time 2, children were more likely to represent initial blends (M = 65.88, SD = 32.97 than final blends (M = 55.92, SD = 33.00, p = .001, d = .30).

PERCENT OF INITIAL & FINAL BLENDS REPRESENTED

IMPLICATIONS FOR PRACTICE

• To effectively teach phonological awareness, it is critical to understand how all aspects of phonemic segmentation develop.

• Not all blends are created equal. It is important that SLPs consider factors that affect development of the ability to segment and represent consonant blends when choosing words for teaching segmentation. For example, jump is not an appropriate word for a student with little segmentation skill, because final nasal blends are particularly difficult.

• Young children tend to spell phonetically. SLPs can assist teachers in understanding how the range of spellings that kindergarten children provide offers valuable insight into their phonological awareness.

• SLPs can collaborate with classroom teachers in early reading and

spelling instruction. Teachers may lack specific knowledge of speech sounds that should influence word choice in early reading and spelling tasks.

PERCENT OF INITIAL BLENDS REPRESENTED BY CLASS

QUESTION 3: Does the class of blends affect the order of development in final blends?PERCENT OF FINAL BLENDS REPRESENTED BY CLASS

H

igh

M

iddle

Lo

w

BLEND SCORES BY SCHOOL AND TIME 1 PROFICIENCY LEVEL

School 1 School 2

RESULTS: At Time 1, children were more likely to represent l-blends (M = 57.54, SD = 33.82) than r-blends (M = 49.12, SD = 39.03, p = .03, d = .23). At Time 2, children were more likely to represent l-blends (M = 72.98, SD = 37.13) than r-blends (M = 60.90, SD = 37.85, p = .00, d = .32) and s-blends (M = 63.51, SD = 35.48, p = .01, d = .26). At Time 3, children were more likely to represent l-blends (M = 74.04, SD = 34.63) than r-blends (M = 62.91, SD = 38.74, p = .00, d = .30).

RESULTS: At all Times, children were more likely to represent final s-blends than final nasal blends (Time 1, M = 71.35, SD = 36.96, M = 32.16, SD = 37.25, p = .00, d = 1.06; Time 2, M = 70.18, SD = 38.67, M = 35.67, SD = 43.12, p = .00, d = .82; Time 3, M = 77.19, SD = 34.02, M = 44.44, SD = 41.47, p = .00, d =.86).

QUESTION 4: Are children more likely to represent homorganic (same place of articulation) than non-homorganic (different place of articulation) blends?

QUESTION 5: Are children more likely to represent initial nasal blends than final nasal blends?

RESULTS: At all Times, children were more likely to represent initial nasal blends than final nasal blends (Time 1, M = 54.39, SD = 41.49, M = 32.16, SD = 37.25, p = .00, d = .56; Time 2, M = 67.54, SD = 40.63, M = 35.67, SD = 43.12, p = .00, d = .76; Time 3, M = 70.18, SD = 38.80, M = 44.44, SD = 41.47, p = .00, d = .64).

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final nasal

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RESULTS: At all Times, children were more likely to represent non-homorganic blends than homorganic blends (Time 1, M = 52.57, SD = 32.96, M = 42.43, SD = 32.61, p = .00, d = .31; Time 2, M = 66.57, SD = 33.52, M = 51.13, SD = 36.22, p = .00, d = .44; Time 3, M = 68.91, SD = 32.27, M = 58.15, SD = 34.87, p = .00, d = .32).

PURPOSE

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non-homorganic

PERCENT OF HOMORGANIC & NON-HOMORGANIC BLENDS REPRESENTED

PERCENT OF INITIAL & FINAL NASAL BLENDS REPRESENTED

Target Child Response

Points Awarded

1st Sound

2nd Sound

Blend

PLAY PLA 1 1 1

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PLAY LA 0 1 0

PLAY BLA 1 1 1

MASK MASC 1 1 1

MASK MAK 0 1 0

MASK MAS 1 0 0

MASK MAC 0 1 0

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INDIVIDUAL DIFFERENCES

QUESTION 2: Does the class of blends affect the order of development in initial blends?

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