Daniel Daigle

The Spelling Skills of French‐Speaking Dyslexic Children

Learning to spell is very difficult for dyslexic children, a phenomenon explained by a deficit in processing phonological information. However, to spell correctly in an alphabetic language such as French, phonological knowledge is not enough. Indeed, the French written system requires the speller to acquire visuo-orthographical and morphological knowledge as well. To date, the majority of studies aimed at describing dyslexic childrens spelling abilities related to English and reading. The general goal of this study is to describe the spelling performance, from an explanatory perspective, of 26 French-Canadian dyslexic children, aged 9 to 12 years. The specific goals are to describe the spelling performances of these pupils in the context of free production and to compare them with the performances of 26 normally achieving children matched on age (CA) and with those of 29 younger normally achieving children matched on reading age (RA). To do so, errors were classified according to phonological, visuo-orthographical and morphological properties of French written words. The results indicate that the dyslexic group scored lower than the CA group but sometimes also lower than the RA group. The results are discussed according to the types of knowledge required to spell correctly in French.

L'évaluation de la conscience morphologique: proposition d'une typologie des tâches

L’étude du rôle de la conscience morphologique dans le développement de la lecture et de la reconnaissance des mots a connu ces dernières années un essor important. Depuis les quinze dernières années, un nombre grandissant de recherches suggèrent que les apprentis lecteurs prennent en compte, très tôt, la structure morphologique des mots. Ce qui ressort de la recension de ces recherches est qu’il n’existe pas d’uniformité par rapport à l’utilisation des tâches utilisées pour évaluer la conscience morphologique. En effet, la manière dont les auteurs qualifient les tâches qu’ils utilisent varie grandement d’une étude à l’autre. L’objectif principal de cet article est de proposer une typologie regroupant les diverses tâches de conscience morphologique recensées en fonction de l’opération mentale qu’elles sollicitent. Au total, dix catégories de tâches ont été établies; ces tâches seront présentées en fonction des appellations utilisées pour les désigner, des objectifs qui leur sont associés, des conditions expérimentales qui les caractérisent, des principaux effets recherchés (âge, niveau de lecture…) et du type de matériel relié à l’utilisation de ces tâches. Cette typologie devrait permettre de clarifier et d’uniformiser les différentes tâches de conscience morphologique et de faciliter le travail des chercheurs qui s’intéressent à ce domaine.

Syllabic Processing in Deaf Readers of French: A Second-Language Question?.

Abstract This study aims at investigating syllabic processes in deaf readers (n=35) who were compared to readers of French as a second language (n=23) and to expert readers (n=40). Two experimental tasks varying in their degree of phonological awareness were created: one awareness– task and one awareness+ task. Results show that all participants have knowledge related to some syllabic structures of written French. However, that knowledge is more evident in the awareness– task than in the awareness+ task. The difference between results on both tasks is greater in the deaf group than in second-language readers or the expert readers. These results are discussed in terms of complementarity of syllabic processes in reading and in relation to the status of French for deaf readers.

Metalinguistic development in French learners enrolled in an immersion programme: A longitudinal study

Research on bilingualism has shown a bilingual advantage in phonological and syntactic awareness, and more recently on some morphological awareness tasks in children who had acquired two languages simultaneously. However, there is still limited knowledge about this advantage in students who acquire a second language in school after having developed a first language. The present longitudinal study addressed this issue by comparing, over the first two years of primary school, the development of metalinguistic abilities in 33 French learners enrolled in an immersion French–German programme to that of 43 French monolingual peers. Results support the bilingual advantage and add to the growing body of research reaching the same conclusion. In this study, this advantage appears as early as in first grade and the gap favouring second language learners widens with time. The results are discussed in light of differences between the characteristics of the two languages.