Writing, as a highly complex strategic literacy skill alongside reading, is an essential prerequisite for learning and determines a student's educational success. In diverse contexts, a student's linguistic repertoire may involve multiple languages, which may serve as mutual resources in his or her multilingual writing skill development. Drawing…

These two studies examined the processes underlying English and Chinese word reading in Chinese-English bilinguals in relation to their experiences with their second language (L2), as determined by length of time in an English-speaking environment. Phonological awareness, morphological awareness and vocabulary measures were administered in English…

We examined reading proficiency, focusing on fluency, in 56 Russian-speaking language minority (LM) students and 56 native Hebrew-speaking (NH) peers. Fifth-grade students completed measures of Hebrew reading accuracy and fluency from word to text level as well as phonological awareness (PA), RAN and vocabulary. LM students read single words less…

Written bilingualism represents a particular type of bilingualism that is not frequently approached. The aim of this study was to investigate the writing and reading abilities of second-generation immigrants, Spanish-English bilinguals in South Florida. 58 participants (36 females, 22 males; 18-39 years of age) were selected. Both parents were…

International studies, such as the "Programme for International Student Assessment" (PISA), have shown that, in most participating countries, students who do not typically speak the test language at home reach lower levels of reading comprehension than students using the test language at home (Stanat & Christensen, "2006").…

This study examined the impact of direct instruction and interactive instruction on immigrant kindergarten children's vocabulary learning during storybook reading. (In the present study the terms "immigrants" and "second language learners" are used alternatively meaning kindergarteners from immigrant families who are in the…

The present paper synthesizes the international research literature on the educational achievement of immigrant and minority language students by articulating three propositions for which there is strong empirical evidence: (a) print access and literacy engagement play a key role in promoting reading comprehension; (b) the development of bilingual…

This study evaluated the impact of two metalinguistic factors, English derivational awareness and English-Spanish cognate awareness, and the impact of two sociocultural factors, maternal education and children's length of residence in Canada, on English Language Learners (ELLs)' vocabulary knowledge. The participants of the study were 89…

The majority of studies examining the language and literacy skills of second generation immigrant bilingual children have focused on the breadth of lexical knowledge in populations with a low level of involvement in literacy activities. This study extends previous work in three ways. First, we focused on a sample of second generation immigrant…