The Role of Morphological Awareness in Children's Reading and Writing Skills

Abstract

Recently there has been a growing interest in the recognition of the role of Morphological Awareness (MA) for children’s literacy development. The present paper analyses a compilation of studies dealing with the idea of MA playing a role in the acquisition of English as a first language (L1) or as a second language (L2). In an attempt to identify the different contributions of MA in learning how to read or write from a very early age, results reveal that MA contributes in a significant way to the development of spelling and reading skills. At the same time, this paper proves that children from as early as kindergarten years can profit from its instruction. However, the greater the age and the practicing experience of the children, the better they perform in the different tasks and the more they leverage from such awareness. Furthermore, transfer of MA from L1 Spanish speakers to English L2 learners is observed, proving an association of MA in the L1 with that in the L2. It is therefore suggested that MA is a useful tool for developing children’s reading and writing in kindergarten and primary school education, or even later, in the case of learning an L2.