Using structural equation modeling the authors evaluated the contribution of morphological awareness, phonological memory, and phonological decoding to reading comprehension, reading vocabulary, spelling, and accuracy and rate of decoding morphologically complex words for 182 4th- and 5th-grade students, 218 6th- and 7th-grade students, and 207 8th- and 9th-grade students in a suburban school district. Morphological awareness made a significant unique contribution to reading comprehension, reading vocabulary, and spelling for all 3 groups, to all measures of decoding rate for the 8th/9th-grade students, and to some measures of decoding accuracy for the 4th/5th-grade and 8th/9th-grade students. Morphological awareness also made a significant contribution to reading comprehension above and beyond that of reading vocabulary for all 3 groups.

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Contributions of morphology beyond phonology to literacy outcomes of upper elementary and middle-school students.

In the past decade, there has been a surge of interest in morphological awareness, which refers to the ability to reflect on and manipulate morphemes and word formation rules in a language. This review provides a critical synthesis of empirical studies on this topic from a broad cross-linguistic perspective. Research with children speaking several languages indicates that knowledge of inflectional morphology is acquired before knowledge of derivational morphology and the morphology of compounds, which continue to develop through the elementary school years. Research establishes that morphological awareness contributes to the decoding of morphologically complex words and contributes to the development of reading comprehension, although the relationship is probably reciprocal rather than unidirectional. Morphological awareness becomes an increasingly important predictor of measures of reading as children grow older. Morphological awareness is intertwined with other aspects of metalinguistic awareness and li...

Morphological Awareness and Learning to Read: A Cross-Language Perspective

The authors reviewed all peer-reviewed studies with participants from preschool to Grade 8 for this meta-analysis of morphological interventions. They identified 22 applicable studies. Instructional effects (Cohen’s d) were averaged by linguistic outcome categories (morphological sublexical, nonmorphological sublexical, lexical, and supralexical) and comparison group (experimental group vs. control or experimental group vs. alternative training). The authors investigated the effects of morphological instruction (a) on reading, spelling, vocabulary, and morphological skills, (b) for less able readers versus undifferentiated samples, (c) for younger versus older students, and (d) in combination with instruction of other literacy skills or in isolation. Results indicate that (a) morphological instruction benefits learners, (b) it brings particular benefits for less able readers, (c) it is no less effective for younger students, and (d) it is more effective when combined with other aspects of literacy instruc...

The Effects of Morphological Instruction on Literacy Skills A Systematic Review of the Literature

Reading research supports the necessity for directly teaching concepts about linguistic structure to beginning readers and to students with reading and spelling difficulties. In this study, experienced teachers of reading, language arts, and special education were tested to determine if they have the requisite awareness of language elements (e.g., phonemes, morphemes) and of how these elements are represented in writing (e.g., knowledge of sound-symbol correspondences). The results were surprisingly poor, indicating that even motivated and experienced teachers typically understand too little about spoken and written language structure to be able to provide sufficient instruction in these areas. The utility of language structure knowledge for instructional planning, for assessment of student progress, and for remediation of literacy problems is discussed.

https://www.paworldclassmath.webs.com/Missing%20Foundation%20(Moats).pdf

The Missing Foundation in Teacher Education: Knowledge of the Structure of Spoken and Written Language.

Classroom observations and in-depth interviews were used to study 9 first-grade teachers from 4 districts who had been nominated by languagearts coordinators as outstanding (N = 5) or typical (N = 4) in their ability to help students develop literacy skills. Based on observational measures of student reading and writing achievement and student engagement, 3 groups of teachers emerged from the original 9. The following practices and beliefs distinguished the instruction of the 3 teachers (2 nominated as outstanding, 1 as typical) whose students demonstrated the highest levels on these measures: (a) coherent and thorough integration of skills with high-quality reading and writing experiences, (b) a high density of instruction (integration of multiple goals in a single lesson), (c) extensive use of scaffolding, (d) encouragement of student self-regulation, (e) a thorough integration of reading and writing activities, (f) high expectations for all students, (g) masterful classroom management, and (h) an aware...

Literacy Instruction in Nine First-Grade Classrooms: Teacher Characteristics and Student Achievement

Some students in the upper elementary grades and high schools may benefit from extended decoding and spelling instruction. These students, because of their age level and reading selections, require strategies going well beyond phonics. For these older readers, including adults, learning about morphological structure may provide the strategies needed to decode and spell multisyllabic words found often in literature and content area texts. In this paper, literature providing a rationale for such instruction is reviewed, and a curriculum and instructional plan is described.

Morphological structure: Latin and Greek roots and affixes as upper grade code strategies

In this paper, the relevance of word structure knowledge to decoding and spelling instruction is discussed. An explicit, discussion oriented, direct approach to teaching decoding and spelling based on word origin and structure results in improved reading and spelling. This instruction leads students to a comparison and contrast of letter-sound correspondences, syllable patterns, and morpheme patterns in English words of Anglo-Saxon, Romance, and Greek origin.

Beyond phonics: Integrated decoding and spelling instruction based on word origin and structure

Research has shown that not all children internalize the structure of English orthography as they learn to decode and spell. In fact, many children have difficulty mastering these two skills. In this paper, the relevance of word structure knowledge to decoding and spelling instruction and performance is discussed. It was anticipated that explicit, discussion oriented, and direct decoding instruction based on word origin and structure would result in improved reading and spelling performance. During the instruction, students compared and contrasted letter-sound correspondences, syllable patterns, and morpheme patterns in English words of Anglo-Saxon, Romance, and Greek origin. Upper elementary grade students receiving the decoding instruction made significant gains in word structure knowledge and in decoding and spelling achievement.

Children's word structure knowledge: Implications for decoding and spelling instruction

This manuscript is based on The Samuel Torrey Orton and June Lyday Orton Memorial Lecture, presented by Marcia K. Henry at the 48th Annual Conference of the International Dyslexia Association. The paper provides a selective biography of Samuel T. Orton, discusses his educational ideas and how they came to be, and considers how current educational research validates much of Orton’s early thinking.

Structured, sequential, multisensory teaching: The Orton legacy

Six myths about beginning and developing reading instruction are examined and debunked. The importance of teaching phonological awareness and decoding in beginning reading and of teaching syllable ...

Marcia K. Henry

Papers

Morphological structure: Latin and Greek roots and affixes as upper grade code strategies

Beyond phonics: Integrated decoding and spelling instruction based on word origin and structure

Children's word structure knowledge: Implications for decoding and spelling instruction

Structured, sequential, multisensory teaching: The Orton legacy

Myths and Realities about Words and Literacy