Preschool morphological training produces long-term improvements in reading comprehension

Solveig-Alma Halaas Lyster, Arne Olav Lervåg, Charles Hulme, Solveig-Alma Halaas Lyster, Arne Olav Lervåg, Charles Hulme

Abstract

We evaluated the effect of morphological awareness training delivered in preschool (8 months before school entry) on reading ability at the end of grade 1 and 5 years later (in Grade 6). In preschool, one group of children received morphological awareness training, while a second group received phonological awareness training. A control group followed the ordinary preschool curriculum. The comparison between each training condition and the control condition is quasi experimental, whereas the comparison between the morphological and phonological treatments is randomized at group level. In Grade 1 children in the morphological awareness training group had significantly higher scores than children in the control group on both word reading and text reading measures, but no differences were found between the experimental groups. In Grade 6 children in the morphological awareness training group had significantly higher scores compared with the control group on a latent measure of reading comprehension, whereas the children in the phonological awareness training group did not differ from the controls; although the experimental groups did not differ significantly from each other. The results suggest that early training in morphological awareness can have long-term effects on children's literacy skills.

Keywords: Follow-up study; Intervention effect; Morphological awareness training; Preschool intervention; Reading comprehension.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
The long-term effects of phoneme awareness and morphological training in kindergarten on reading comprehension and word decoding in Grade 6. Latent variables are drawn as ellipses, and observed variables are drawn as rectangles. One-headed arrows are regressions, factor loadings or residuals, and two-headed arrows are correlations. Solid lines represent significant effects, and dashed lines represent non-significant effects. Coefficients outside of brackets are fully standardised on both the X and Y variables. Coefficients within brackets are standardised only on the Y variables, indicating the difference between the training groups and the controls in standard deviation units on the dependent variable. **p < .01
Fig. 2
Fig. 2
The long-term effects of phoneme awareness and morphological training in kindergarten on reading comprehension and word decoding in end of Grades 1 and 6, controlling for differences in preschool cognitive skills and variations in mother’s education. Latent variables are drawn as ellipses, and observed variables are drawn as rectangles. One-headed arrows are regressions, factor loadings or residuals, and two-headed arrows are correlations. Solid lines represent significant effects, and dashed lines represent non-significant effects. Coefficients outside brackets are fully standardised on both the X and Y variables. Coefficients within brackets are standardised only on the Y variables, indicating the difference between the training groups and the controls in standard deviation units on the dependent variable. **p < .01; *p < .05

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