This study examined the longitudinal interplay of fathers' and mothers' literacy teaching and children's word reading skills and interest in literacy. A total of 194 second-year kindergarten (K2) children and their fathers and mothers in Hong Kong participated. At the three time points from K2 to K3 (i.e., the third year in kindergarten), fathers and mothers independently reported the frequency of their own literacy teaching activities. Mothers reported their children's interest in literacy-related activities. The children were individually assessed on Chinese word reading. The results from cross-lagged panel analysis showed that the children's prior literacy interest was associated with later frequency of parental literacy teaching, but not the other way around. No significant relations were observed between the children's word-reading skills and the literacy teaching provided by their mothers or by their fathers. Additionally, it was the children's earlier word reading skills that predicted their later development of literacy interest, but not vice versa. Thus, the parents seemed to adjust their home literacy teaching flexibly in response to their perceptions of their children's literacy interest. The findings also underscore the potential importance of word reading abilities in fostering children's literacy interest. Copyright © 2024 Springer.

This study investigated the feasibility and effectiveness of using a flipped classroom (FC) approach to combine self-regulated learning (SRL) instruction and out-of-class eLearning activities in a two-year reading intervention program to facilitate students' learning of classical Chinese reading. A total of 352 junior secondary students from three Hong Kong secondary schools participated in the study voluntarily. Using a quasi-experimental design, students from each school were assigned to one of the following conditions: SRL instruction plus out-of-class eLearning (EG-I+E), SRL instruction only (EG-I), and control (CG). Both quantitative methods, including reading tests and student questionnaires, and qualitative methods, including teacher and student interviews, were adopted to collect data for the program evaluation. Findings indicate that after implementing the intervention program, EG students perceived significant changes in their classical Chinese lessons to be more SRL-oriented. While all treatment groups significantly improved their performance in the reading post-tests, only EG students significantly improved their strategy use, self-efficacy, and intrinsic motivation. Although both EG groups had similar improvements in all outcome measures, teachers and students of EG-I+E opined that the eLearning component of FC facilitated teachers' implementation of the intervention and students' strategy learning and motivation. Findings are discussed to shed light on applying SRL instruction and FC in a school subject long dominated by teacher-centered instruction. Copyright © 2024 Springer .

To succeed in integrated writing tasks, source use is commonly regarded as an essential but demanding skill for students at different educational levels. Whereas substantial efforts have been devoted to English settings, it is less clear how students use sources in non-English contexts. This study investigated source use (i.e., source idea use and linguistic transformation) in a Chinese integrated commentary writing task undertaken by 223 secondary students in Hong Kong. Textual analysis showed that for source idea use, secondary students tended to borrow ideas from source texts more frequently than they did when generating original ideas. As for linguistic transformation, students showed a significantly higher frequency of copying information from sources than paraphrasing. Furthermore, we found a significant impact of source use on writing performance, accounting for approximately 10% of the variance in task performance. Additionally, the predictive effect of the total number of original ideas on writing performance became significant after the total number of ideas from both source texts entered the model. This study provides a comprehensive understanding of secondary students’ source use in a Chinese integrated commentary writing task, with implications for integrated writing instruction and assessment. Copyright © 2025 The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature B.V.

Word reading fluency is crucial for early L2 development. Moreover, the practice of digital reading has become increasingly common for both children and adults. Therefore, the current study investigated factors that explain digital word reading fluency in English (L2) among Chinese children from Hong Kong. Eighty-six children (age: M = 9.78, SD = 1.42) participated in a digital silent word reading test using a mobile phone, a computer, or a tablet. This is a 10-minute timed test of English word reading. Overall, children’s digital word reading fluency was highly correlated with print word reading fluency, even when measured a year apart. A hierarchical regression model revealed that socio-economic status ( β = .333), grade ( β = .455), and English reading motivation ( β = .375) were positively and uniquely associated with performance in digital reading. These predictors explained 48.6% of the total variance in task performance. Two additional variables, i.e., the type of reading device and extraneous cognitive load, were included as well. Digital word reading fluency was significantly poorer when done using a phone as compared to a computer ( β = -.187). No significant difference was found between reading on a tablet and a computer. Extraneous cognitive load ( β = -.255) negatively and uniquely explained digital word reading fluency as well. Overall, the model explained 58.8% of the total variance. The present study represents the first attempt to highlight a comprehensive set of predictors of digital word reading fluency. Copyright ©2024 Springer.

This study aims to explore the specific contributions of derivational, inflectional, and compounding morphological awareness to reading comprehension through decoding and syntactic awareness. A total of 181 Grade 3 and 4 Chinese primary school children learning English as a second language in Hong Kong participated in this study. The results of structural equational modeling show that all the three types of morphological awareness contributed to reading comprehension through decoding and syntactic awareness, and they explained about 66% of the variance in decoding and 47.2% of the variance in syntactic awareness. Derivational and inflectional morphological awareness affected decoding more strongly than compounding morphological awareness. Derivational and inflectional morphological awareness had stronger effects on decoding than on syntactic awareness, whereas compounding morphological awareness had stronger effect on syntactic awareness than on decoding. In addition, derivational and inflectional morphological awareness had unique direct effects on reading comprehension beyond decoding and syntactic awareness. The unique effect of inflectional morphological awareness was stronger than that of derivational morphological awareness. These results advance our understanding of the multiple roles of the three types of morphological awareness in reading comprehension. Copyright ©2024 Springer.

Literacy skills are important for children’s development. The present study explored the effectiveness of a parent coaching approach on the reading and spelling skills and compared cognitive-linguistic skills performances between Chinese children with and without dyslexia. Participants were 33 children with dyslexia and 77 children without dyslexia, as well as their parent, in Hong Kong. Children were divided into three groups: dyslexia with training, non-dyslexia with training, and non-dyslexia without training. Parents in both training groups were instructed to facilitate children’s literacy skills. A series of cognitive-linguistic skills were tested on children at pretest. Children received measures of character reading, word reading, and word spelling before and after the parent coaching. Results showed that, compared to children without dyslexia, children with dyslexia performed significantly more poorly on all cognitive-linguistic skills. Analyses of the training effect demonstrated that the dyslexia with training group significantly improved their performances on word reading and word spelling following the intervention. In addition, those without dyslexia who experienced training performed significantly better on character reading and word spelling at posttest than pretest. These results suggest that parent coaching can be one potentially effective method of promoting literacy skills among children both with and without dyslexia. Copyright ©2024 Springer.

While extensive quantitative research has shed light on the cognitive mechanisms of dyslexia, few mixed-methods studies have been conducted to examine the perceptions of and attitudes towards learning in children with dyslexia, especially in Hong Kong, a bilingual context. In addition, the validity of the metaphor elicitation technique, which was adopted in previous interview studies, has not yet been examined in children. Therefore, 30 children with dyslexia (age range: 8–13; 10 females) in Hong Kong were interviewed for metaphors regarding six domains: Chinese reading, Chinese writing, having Chinese lessons, English reading, solving maths problems, and dyslexia. Word reading fluency and parent-rated learning interest and confidence were measured to validate the use of the metaphor elicitation method in assessing children’s reading attitudes in both Chinese and English using correlation analyses. Perceptions were examined by way of qualitative analyses based on the metaphor entailments. Results showed that children who expressed more positive attitudes towards English reading performed better in English reading. Moreover, the attitudes also positively correlated with the corresponding parents’ ratings. These findings suggested that the metaphor elicitation technique is a valid method for assessing attitudes towards English reading in children with dyslexia. Furthermore, their perceptions of dyslexia and learning generally corresponded to those from previous interview studies despite differences in languages and contexts. Importantly, descriptions related to multiple themes, including metalinguistic awareness, cognitive skills, coping strategies, and dyslexia, were well-aligned with scientific findings, demonstrating that children already have a good understanding of dyslexia and various learning domains. Copyright © 2023 The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature B.V.

This study aims to advance our understanding of the role of word knowledge in second language (L2) reading comprehension by exploring whether morphological awareness and vocabulary assessed one year ago contribute to decoding and listening comprehension which in turn contribute to reading comprehension in Chinese children learning English as an L2. A total of 167 Grade 3 and 4 primary school students (Mage = 8.99 years) in Hong Kong were tested on English morphological awareness and vocabulary at Time 1, and they were also tested on English decoding, listening comprehension, and reading comprehension at Time 2, one year later. Our regression models showed that word knowledge tested at Time 1 was a significant predictor of decoding, listening comprehension, and reading comprehension at Time 2; and word knowledge explained more variance in decoding, listening comprehension, and reading comprehension in children who had higher levels of word knowledge. The results of structural equation modeling indicated that vocabulary contributed to reading comprehension fully through decoding and listening comprehension. Morphological awareness contributed to reading comprehension partially through vocabulary and decoding, and it also had a unique direct contribution to reading comprehension. The findings from this study suggested the importance of emphasizing word knowledge in developing children’s reading comprehension in an L2 at an early stage of learning to read. Copyright © 2022 The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature B.V.

Integrated writing is increasingly used in language assessment programmes. As a hybrid task, it requires students to coordinate different language skills, i.e. listening, reading and writing, to retrieve information from multiple sources, and compose an essay for a specific purpose. Tapping into the varied skills that contribute to successful integrated writing is especially beneficial for low proficiency students. However, the mechanisms underlying the impact of these skills on integrated writing performance have yet to be thoroughly studied. This study sampled 103 first-year undergraduate students in Hong Kong who showed relatively low proficiency in Chinese language. They completed three independent tasks measuring their listening, reading, and writing skills; an integrated listening-reading-writing task; and an integrated writing strategy use questionnaire. The results indicated that together, the independent skills accounted for 29.5% of the variance in integrated writing performance, suggesting that integrated writing is a skill that goes far beyond the simple combination of listening, reading, and writing. Independent writing showed the strongest correlation with integrated writing, while both independent listening and independent writing exerted direct and indirect effects on integrated writing performance. However, the effect of reading on integrated writing performance was insignificant, even though the two were significantly correlated. These results offer insights into the complex relationships between the skills. The findings enrich our understanding of the construct of integrated writing, as well as suggest strategies for teaching less proficient learners. Copyright © 2021 The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature B.V.

This study investigated the direct and indirect roles of verbal and visuospatial memory in Chinese reading comprehension. One hundred twenty-eight Cantonese-speaking children participated in the study at the end of their 3rd year of kindergarten in Hong Kong. Both verbal and visuospatial memory were found to be significantly associated with Chinese reading comprehension. Path analysis showed that visuospatial memory was significantly associated with reading comprehension through word reading. Verbal memory was associated with reading comprehension indirectly through listening comprehension. Additionally, the direct path from visuospatial memory to reading comprehension was significant when word reading and listening comprehension were considered simultaneously. The findings of the direct and unique role of visuospatial memory in reading comprehension in Chinese elaborated and extended our understanding of the simple view of reading in young children in a non-alphabetic language. Copyright © 2020 Springer Nature B.V.