Govor, Vol. 40 No. 1, 2023.
Original scientific paper
https://doi.org/10.22210/govor.2023.40.03
Understanding of grammatical constructs and phonological processing skills in preschool children
Martina Galeković
orcid.org/0000-0002-1798-3387
; Center for Education Childner and Youth Velika Gorica
Abstract
The association between phonological awareness, grammatical knowledge, reading and writing skills, and academic achievement has been confirmed by research in various linguistic domains.
Previous studies have established the mutual relationship between phonology and other language components. Language abilities are an important prerequisite for the development of phonological awareness, and children with a richer vocabulary tend to exhibit more advanced
phonological awareness skills.
The main objectives of this research were to determine gender differences in variables of phonological memory and phonological awareness and to identify differences among children
with varying levels of grammatical and syntactic understanding. The study involved preschoolaged children (N = 74) enrolled in a preschool program. The sample consisted of participants ranging in age from 5;11 to 7;00 years. The results partially supported the first hypothesis, suggesting no statistically significant differences in phonological memory and phonological awareness between boys and girls. However, the second hypothesis was confirmed – children with higher levels of grammatical understanding achieved better results on phonological memory and phonological awareness tasks. The subjects were also compared based on chronological age, and no statistically significant difference was found between the older and younger groups of children in phonological memory and phonological awareness. This study contributes to the understanding of early language abilities in the acquisition of reading and writing skills, emphasizing the importance of assessing grammatical understanding and preliteracy skills as a crucial part of preschool language development.
Keywords
phonological awareness; phonological memory; grammar comprehension; receptive language
Hrčak ID:
309046
URI
Publication date:
20.10.2023.
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