Predicting curriculum and test performance at age 11 years from pupil background, baseline skills and phonological awareness at age 5 years.
BACKGROUND
Phonological awareness tests are amongst the best predictors of literacy and predict outcomes of Key Stage 1 assessment of the National Curriculum in England at age 7. However, it is unknown whether their ability to predict National Curricular outcomes extends to Key Stage 2 assessments given at age 11, or also whether the predictive power of such tests is independent of letter-knowledge. We explored the unique predictive validity of phonological awareness and early literacy measures, and other pupil background measures taken at age 5 in the prediction of English, Maths, and Science performance at age 11.


METHODS
Three hundred and eighty-two children from 21 primary schools in one Local Educational Authority were assessed at age 5 and followed to age 11 (Key Stage 2 assessment). Teaching assistants (TAs) administered phonological awareness tasks and early literacy measures. Baseline and Key Stage 2 performance measures were collected by teachers.


RESULTS
Phonological awareness was a significant unique predictor of all nine outcome measures after baseline assessment and pupil background measures were first controlled in regression analyses, and continued to be a significant predictor of reading, maths, and science performance, and teacher assessments after early literacy skill and letter-knowledge was controlled. Gender predicted performance in writing, the English test, and English teacher assessment, with girls outperforming boys.


CONCLUSIONS
Phonological awareness is a unique predictor of general curricular attainment independent of pupil background, early reading ability and letter-knowledge. Practically, screening of phonological awareness and basic reading skills by school staff in year 1 significantly enhances the capacity of schools to predict curricular outcomes in year 6.
Savage
Robert
R
Faculty of Education, McGill University, Montreal, Canada. Robert.savage@mcgill.ca
Carless
Sue
S
Ferraro
Vittoria
V
D001288:Attention; D001364:Awareness; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D003479:Curriculum; D003710:Demography; D004519:Education, Special / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D004521:Educational Measurement; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D010700:Phonetics; D011446:Prospective Studies; D013063:Speech Discrimination Tests; D013067:Speech Perception; D013334:Students / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*