Role of Vocabulary on Literacy Development of Spanish-Speaking and Cantonese-Speaking English Language Learners in the United States

• In Event: Effect of Vocabulary on Literacy From Pre-K Through Grade 2: Spanish, Cantonese, and Tagalog English Language Learners

Abstract

Background. Vocabulary is a key component of literacy development for monolingual and bilingual children alike (August & Shanahan, 2006; Snow, Burns, & Griffin, 1998). Children with larger vocabularies make faster progress in acquiring literacy, especially during the first years of reading instruction. Although most early literacy research has focused on monolingual English-speaking children, recent studies have explored the impact of oral proficiency skills on early literacy skills of English language learners (ELL). However, the majority of studies with ELLs have examined Spanish-speaking children (Miller et al., 2006; Proctor, Carlo, August, & Snow, 2005) and the research with ELLs whose native language does not share similar written or phonetic characteristics with English, such as Cantonese, is sparse. Moreover, a recent study with ELLs (Branum-Martin et al., 2009) shows that different types of vocabulary assessments (e.g. receptive, expressive, narrative) measure different aspects of a child’s vocabulary knowledge, suggesting that multiple measures of vocabulary are needed for a complete picture of the child’s word knowledge.
This paper examines the various aspects of English vocabulary and their effects on English narrative and reading skills for both Spanish-speaking and Cantonese-speaking ELLs.
Methods and Data Sources. Three measures of vocabulary were used to assess 42 Cantonese-speaking and 31 Spanish-speaking ELLs during the spring of second grade. English receptive vocabulary was measured using the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test-3 (PPVT-3; Dunn & Dunn, 1997). English expressive vocabulary was measured with (a) the picture vocabulary subtest from the Woodcock Language Proficiency Battery (WLPB; Woodcock, 1991) and (b) elicited narrative samples using the wordless picture book, Frog, Where are you? (Mayer, 1969). Transcribed narratives were analyzed for number of different words (NDW), total number of words (TNW), and type/token word ratio (TTR). Narratives were also coded for narrative quality according to the Narrative Scoring Scheme (NSS; Miller & Iglesias, 2006). English reading abilities were measured with the letter-word identification and passage comprehension subtests in the WLPB. All children were enrolled in early-exit transitional bilingual programs at three schools in a large urban school district in northern California.
Results. On average, both Spanish-speaking and Cantonese-speaking ELLs scored one standard deviation below monolingual norms on the standardized vocabulary assessments (PPVT-3 and WLPB). However, on average, both groups scored at the monolingual mean on the two reading measures. Correlational analysis shows that PPVT, WLPB and NDW were highly correlated. Preliminary multiple linear regression analyses suggest that vocabulary predicts narratives skills and reading scores for both ELL groups. PPVT, WLPB and the NDW contained in narratives predicted English narrative and reading scores, but the TNW and TTR in narratives did not.
Significance. These findings offer important theoretical and practical implications for schools and districts that are working with bilingual ELLs. First, our results highlight the importance of English vocabulary in the acquisition of narratives and reading. Moreover, outcomes suggest that measuring vocabulary using different types of assessments, and as well as measuring print literacy performance, provides a more complete picture of English language and literacy skills for ELLs. Educational and research implications are discussed.

Authors

• Yuuko Uchikoshi, University of California - Davis

• Carrie A. Strohl, University of California - Davis