Rapid automatized naming (RAN) powerfully predicts word-level reading fluency in the first 2 years of school as well as further reading development. Here, we analyze various RAN stimuli (objects and digits) and oral/silent word reading (OWR/SWR) modalities to find feasible measures for predicting early reading development. The RAN performances of…

'Taking part' in conversations requires different activities from the interactants depending on the kind of conversation. This article investigates co-constructions in oral peer group discussions of elementary school children from grades 2 to 6 (7-12 years old). Although dissent is the starting point of argumentations, negotiating processes in…

By focusing on 179 elementary school children, the present cross-sectional questionnaire study aimed to examine gender and immigrant-native differences in competence and affect self-concepts as well as academic achievement and the relations of those two self-concept components to academic achievement in the domains of mathematics and German.…

Reading a word requires several component processes. The dual route cascaded (DRC) model provides a characterization of these component processes and their involvement in different reading routes. We tested how relevant precursor skills associated with these component processes predict the use of the sublexical and lexical route in beginning…

This single case study (multiple baselines) evaluates the efficacy of an intervention called "reading racetracks" among three eight-year-old boys with diverse backgrounds, including learning disabilities, limited language proficiency due to migration, and socio-economic challenges. Conducted over three weeks, the training demonstrated…

The increasing number of students who lack proficient reading skills is well known in Germany, as well as globally. Students with learning disabilities (LD), problem behavior, and German as a second language (L2) may face even greater hurdles. However, it is essential for teachers to provide adequate support to maintain equal educational…

Studies investigating relations between morphological awareness and literacy in German, a language with a rather transparent but asymmetric orthography, are sparse. Little is known about the role of grade level for these relationships and of their relative strength compared to those between other language-related variables and literacy skills.…

Background: In countries with German as an official language, children with German as a second language perform overall worse in school than their German native speaking peers. This particularly affects written language skills, which require advanced language knowledge. The reasons are manifold, but one is prominent, namely poor vocabulary…

Morpheme-based literacy training programs are widely used in German primary schools. This study investigated whether (1) morphological training is effective early in development (Grade 2) and (2) literacy gains can be attributed to advanced morphological processing. Fifty-two German-speaking second-graders participated in an eight-week…

We examined the cross-lagged relations between reading and spelling in five alphabetic orthographies varying in consistency (English, French, Dutch, German, and Greek). Nine hundred and forty-one children were followed from Grade 1 to Grade 2 and were tested on word and pseudoword reading fluency and on spelling to dictation. Results indicated…

Based on a theoretical model of instructional quality this study investigates the influence of different dimensions of instructional quality in the school entrance phase on students' language development taking into account child and family background factors as well as structural characteristics of the classroom and teacher's educational beliefs.…

Masked priming studies have shown that readers decompose morphologically complex words ("read+er"). Interindividual differences have been suggested to affect this phenomenon. However, its development is poorly understood. We addressed this issue by taking a longitudinal approach that allows greater rigor in establishing the relationship…

In this article we present a new method for estimating children's total vocabulary size based on a language corpus in German. We drew a virtual sample of different lexicon sizes from a corpus and let the virtual sample "take" a vocabulary test by comparing whether the items were included in the virtual lexicons or not. This enabled us to…

Although phonological awareness (PA) and rapid automatized naming (RAN) are confirmed as early predictors of reading in a large number of orthographies, it is as yet unclear whether the predictive patterns are universal or language specific. This was examined in a longitudinal study across Grades 1 and 2 with 1,120 children acquiring one of five…

We investigated the predictive power of cognitive skills and background variables of 769 first and second grade children learning to read two orthographically different languages Finnish and German in three countries Finland, Germany and Italy. Main results from stepwise regression models showed that in all countries word reading at first grade…