Correlates of orthographic learning in third-grade children's silent reading

This study examined word identification, phonological recoding efficiency, familiar word reading efficiency, orthographic choice for familiar words and serial naming speed as potential correlates of orthographic learning following silent reading in third-grade children. Children silently read a series of short stories, each containing six repetitions of a different target non-word. They subsequently read target non-words faster than homophones and preferred target non-words to homophones in an orthographic choice task, indicating that they had formed functional orthographic representations of the target non-words through phonologically recoding them during silent story reading. Target non-word orthographic choice was correlated with all measures bar non-symbol naming speed. The association between phonological recoding efficiency and orthographic learning lends support to the hypothesis that self-teaching occurs through phonological recoding even in silent reading. Our findings were not generally consistent with the view that serial naming speed assesses orthographic learning aptitude.