The Development of easyCBM Spanish Literacy Assessments for Use in Grades K-2. Technical Report #1301.

In this study, we describe two studies used to select appropriate assessments to measure phonemic awareness, alphabetic principle, and fluency in the Spanish language for students receiving literacy instruction in Spanish. We first describe two studies in which we use linear regression and correlations to examine the appropriateness of different types of phonological awareness and early reading measures for firstand second-grade students receiving literacy instruction in Spanish. We report our findings from two studies carried out with two distinct populations: native English speakers enrolled in a Spanish language immersion program at a small suburban school and native Spanish speakers enrolled in a dual language immersion program at a large urban school (reported in the section identified as Initial Item Development Study). In both studies, performance on a measure of Syllable Sounds reading was the most significant predictor of oral reading fluency. We then provide alternate form reliability information for each of the easyCBM Spanish literacy measures (reported in the section identified as Reliability Study). SPANISH EASYCBM Page 4 The Development of the easyCBM Spanish Literacy Assessments for Use in Grades K-2 Over the past decade, there has been a 65% increase in the number of Spanish-speaking students attending school in the United States (Woolfolk, 2004). In the 1999-2000 school year, 12.7% of all public and public charter schools in the United States included immersion programs (National Center for Education Statistics, 2002). In many of these schools, students received at least part of their instruction in Spanish. Educators at these schools are often faced with a dilemma if they want to use student performance assessments to monitor the progress students are making in developing literacy skills. Measures developed for use with English-speaking populations may not be appropriate for use with students receiving instruction in a language other than English. Our study addresses this concern. We examine the appropriateness of different measures of early literacy designed for use with students receiving instruction in Spanish. Measuring Early Literacy Skills in English One skill area commonly included in English literacy assessments is phonological awareness, or an understanding of the smaller units of speech contained within a word. In English, phonemic segmentation and blending are two areas of phonological awareness commonly assessed. However, teachers who work with students receiving literacy instruction in Spanish express dissatisfaction with these measures for their students, suggesting that syllables, rather than phonemes are more appropriate for students receiving literacy instruction in Spanish (Gonzalez, Alonzo, & Tindal, 2007). The majority of research on the relationship between phonological awareness and more advanced reading skills focuses on students who speak English as a first language and are receiving literacy instruction in English. Early studies in this area show a correlation between 1 SPANISH EASYCBM Page 5 phonological awareness and more advanced reading skills (Share, Jorm & McClean, as cited in Ehri, 2001). Recent research on phonological awareness emphasizes the reciprocal influence view on phonological awareness and reading expressed by Stahl and Murray (1994). Specifically, at early stages of literacy acquisition, phonological awareness appears to predict reading ability. However, as more advanced reading skills develop, the relationship shifts, with more sophisticated phonological awareness skills resulting from individual differences in reading ability. In a longitudinal study, Hogan, Catts and Little (2005) determined that phonological awareness in kindergarten predicted word reading ability in second grade, suggesting that between kindergarten and second grade, phonological awareness is a prerequisite to more advanced reading skills. In contrast, phonological awareness in second grade did not predict reading ability in fourth grade. Furthermore, results suggested that by second grade, the best predictor of word reading ability is word reading ability in previous years. These findings indicate that phonological awareness is an important predictor of reading ability at the earliest stages of literacy acquisition. However, as students’ reading skills develop, the role of phonological awareness becomes less important. This conclusion supports the reciprocal influence theory, suggesting that the predictive power of phonological awareness declines over time, as students become more skilled readers. Finding Appropriate Measures of Early Literacy in Spanish Because English and Spanish are both alphabetic languages, it is likely that some understanding of the connection between written letters and sounds is necessary for learning to read in Spanish, as well. However, in designing assessments in Spanish, one cannot assume that findings related to specific measures of phonological awareness in English apply to students 2 SPANISH EASYCBM Page 6 receiving instruction in Spanish. Although Spanish and English are based on similar alphabets, they differ in orthographic consistency, or the degree to which the relationships between written letters (graphemes) and the sounds that they make (phonemes) are consistent and predictable. According to Wagner et al. (1997), “the importance of phonological processing abilities may vary as a function of the regularity of the correspondence between print and pronunciation” (p. 17-18). The research on the relationship between phonological awareness and reading in Spanish is limited, although a correlation between phonological awareness and reading skills has been reported (Durgunoglu, Nagy & Hancin-Bhatt, 1993; Laefstadt & Gerber, 2005). However, the majority of research on phonological awareness in Spanish focuses on the potential for phonological awareness skills learned in Spanish to facilitate literacy acquisition in English. Although this is an important area of research, due to the common concern that Spanish literacy instruction will interfere with a student’s ability to become proficient in English (Crawford, 1998), research suggests that, contrary to this belief, education in the native language can have a positive impact on second language acquisition. Durgunoglu, Nagy and Hancin-Bhatt (1993) investigated phonological awareness in Spanish-speaking first-graders who had received very limited instruction in English. Their results suggest that, in addition to predicting second language phonological awareness, the phonological abilities that Spanish-speaking children acquire in their native language contribute to their ability to recognize words in English. These findings imply that phonological awareness is a valuable skill for students who will ultimately develop literacy in both Spanish and English. The apparent role of phonological awareness in predicting more advanced Spanish reading ability and the transferability of Spanish literacy skills to English suggest that 3 SPANISH EASYCBM Page 7 phonological awareness is an important area of instruction and assessment for students developing literacy in Spanish. However, care must be taken in determining how best to assess phonological awareness in Spanish. One of the most fundamental differences between Spanish and English is the consistency of their orthographies. The Spanish language has a highly consistent orthography. According to DeFior, Martos and Cary (2002), “Spanish is a clear example of a shallow orthography. Each grapheme has a clear and precise phonemic translation” (p.137). In contrast, grapheme-phoneme correspondences in English are much less consistent, resulting in many irregularly spelled words. Because of the regularity of phonemes, literacy instruction in Spanish often emphasizes syllables, rather than individual phonemes (Alvarez, Carreiras & Perea, 2004; Carreiras & Perea, 2004; Jimenez Gonzalez & Garcia, 1995). According to Alvarez, Carreiras and Perea (2004), “most readers in Spanish have learned to read via a syllabic method, taking advantage of the fact that Spanish has clear syllable boundaries” (p. 430). This syllable-based instruction is supported by recent studies on the importance of the syllable as a unit of processing in Spanish. Alvarez, Carreiras and Perea’s (2004) study indicates that the syllable is an important unit of processing in Spanish, and that it exerts an effect on language comprehension at the level of phonological understanding. The effect of syllable-level word properties on Spanish-speaking students’ reading skills implies that understanding the syllables within words represents an important component of literacy in Spanish. Considering this evidence for attention to the syllable, along with the relative consistency of the phonemes within Spanish syllables, it is logical to propose that phonemic awareness may not be as important in Spanish as it is in a less orthographically consistent language such as English. It is clear that phonemic awareness is a useful predictor of early 4 SPANISH EASYCBM Page 8 reading skills in English. Despite limited evidence, preliminary findings suggest that phonological awareness is an important early reading skill in Spanish as well. However, it does not necessarily follow that the same ways of measuring phonological awareness will be equally appropriate across the two languages. In our study, we examine the appropriateness of different early reading measures for use with elementary students receiving instruction in Spanish as opposed to English. Methods: Initial Item Development Study We used a correlational design to study the relative validity of the use of different measures of phonological awareness for firstand second-grade students receiving literacy instruction in Spanish. We conducted the study twice, with different study populations, to test the robustness of our findings across different samples with diffe