For the monolingual population, research has shown that vocabulary knowledge is closely related to reading achievement. However, the role of vocabulary has not been studied as extensively in the bilingual population. It is important to look at vocabulary to better understand reading achievement in the bilingual population in the United States.…

This article describes a series of studies that examine the development of literacy in elementary school Spanish-speaking second-language learners. Findings from the research that addresses our first question-regarding cross-language relationships-indicate that first-language reading skills are related to second-language reading skills, but that…