Modelling Reading Acquisition

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Frith’s Model

Many linguists have tried to model the stages and process a child goes through when they are learning to read. A few of the main ones are Frith’s model, Ehri’s model, Chall’s model.

Logographic stage

At this stage, the child is chiefly concerned with graphemes as visual objects which they are able to recognise by sight (as they would recognise what a chair is from what it looks like).
As such, they will first learn that image of a word represents a thing.

Example

For example, they will probably recognise their own name written down.
At this point, letters aren’t seen as individual and combinations as making sounds.

Alphabetic stage

At this stage, the child starts to differentiate between words and other symbols and as a result, develops the concept of letters and sounds having a relationship.
The child learns some phoneme-grapheme correspondence and the ability to combine sounds in order to form words.

Alphabetic stage cont.

They acquire knowledge of letter order and phonological factors affecting pronunciation.
They begin to decode words they are unfamiliar with.
Some linguists have said that the child can do this as part of their natural development, but most agree that this comes from exposure to reading and other literacy activities.

Orthographic stage

At this stage, the child does not need to phonologically recode very much, but can, more often than not, recognise the word and its meaning (from their internal lexicon).
When they are repeatedly exposed to the same sequence of graphemes, they store their knowledge of the word in an orthographic and phonological lexicon to save time phonologically decoding the word each time.

Challenges

This theory is challenged as dyslexic children struggle with the alphabetic stage and often move straight onto the orthographic stage which delays the reading process.
A possible alternative is found in Ehri’s model.

Ehri’s Model

Many linguists have tried to model the stages and process a child goes through when they are learning to read. A few of the main ones are Frith’s model, Ehri’s model, Chall’s model.

Pre-alphabetic phase

Words are read through memorisation or from guess based on context.

Partial-alphabetical phase

Some letters are known and their respective phonemes are learned – words are learned by sight in relation to context.

Full-alphabetic phase

There is extensive knowledge of phoneme-grapheme correspondence and unfamiliar words can be decoded and store these in their memory post-analysis.

Consolidated-alphabetical phase

Larger words and differing phonemes and meanings are learned (awareness of homophones etc here too).

Challenges

Beech challenges Ehri’s model by saying that it is unclear whether a child progresses from one phase to the other or whether a child can be in 2+ phases at the time.

Chall’s Model

Many linguists have tried to model the stages and process a child goes through when they are learning to read. A few of the main ones are Frith’s model, Ehri’s model, Chall’s model.

Stage 0

Stage 0: pre-reading (pseudo reading) - up to 6 years:
- Mock reading – will repeat what has been previously read to them.
- Can name letters of the alphabet.
- Reliant on images.

Stage 1

Stage 1: initial reading and decoding – 6 to 7 years:
- Learns that there is a relationship between letters and sounds.
- Simple texts with high frequency words and words with phoneme-grapheme correspondence can be read.
- Monosyllabic words can be ‘sounded out’.

Stage 2

Stage 2: Confirmation and fluency – 7 to 8 years:
- Simple and familiar stories can be read – this will be increasing fluent.
- Decoding ability improves.
- Number of words than can be read by sight improves.
- Awareness of context improves.

Stage 3

Stage 3: reading to learn – 8 to 14 years:
- Reading is used to acquire knowledge.
- Experience of new feelings.
- Learn new attitudes.
- Generally, one point of view.

Stage 4

Stage 4: multiple viewpoints – 14 to 18 years:
- Reading is done widely through a large range of material (often complex material, too).
- Descriptive, informative and narrative texts are read.
- Different views are encountered.

Stage 5

Stage 5: Construction and reconstruction – 18 years plus:
- Reading is done for the reader’s needs – this may be personal or professional.
- All about the integration of knowledge that you hold with the knowledge that others hold – synthesis.
- Rapid and efficient.