Cette thèse est centrée sur l'évaluation des capacités de lecture et reliées à la lecture des collégiens normo-lecteurs français. Le premier objectif est d'identifier les capacités engagées dans la compréhension écrite. Dans les premiers grades (6 et 7), les capacités de compréhension écrite sont surtout expliquées par celles de compréhension orale, de conscience morphologique et de lecture de mots irréguliers, mais pas par la lecture de pseudomots, quelle que soit la mesure (précision ou temps). Ce dernier résultat se retrouve dans les grades supérieurs (8 et 9) dans lesquels la lecture de mots irréguliers n'a plus d'incidence sur la compréhension écrite. Le second objectif est d'élaborer un outil diagnostique des capacités de lecture, et des capacités reliées, chez les collégiens (6 à 9). L'examen des capacités d'identifications des mots écrits montre que les effets de régularité et de lexicalité sont significatifs, quelle que soit la mesure, et le niveau scolaire. Les effets de longueur varient selon la lexicalité: quel que soit le niveau scolaire, les pseudomots longs sont lus moins précisément et moins rapidement que les courts alors que les mots irréguliers longs ne sont jamais pénalisés. Le niveau de lecture (mesuré à l'aide d'un test Français de référence) est déterminé surtout par les capacités de lecture de pseudomots, et également par celles de conscience phonémique mais uniquement lorsque les temps sont pris en compte. La construction cohérente de l'outil est vérifiée à l'aide d'une classification hiérarchique de variables. L'ensemble des résultats souligne l'importance de considérer pour toutes évaluations les temps de traitement en plus de la précision. / The aim of this thesis was to evaluate the reading and reading-related skills of French middle school students (Grades 6 to 9). The first objective was to identify the capacity involved in reading comprehension at the middle school level. In the first grades (Grades 6 and 7), the results show that reading comprehension skills are largely predicted by listening comprehension, morphological awareness, and irregular word reading, but not pseudoword reading skills, whatever the measure (accuracy or time). This latter result is found in the higher grades (Grades 8 and 9) in which irregular word reading has no impact on reading comprehension, again regardless of the measure. The second objective was to develop a diagnostic evaluation tool for word-level reading and reading-related skills in middle school students. The examination of word-level reading skills at middle school showed significant effects of both regularity and lexicality, whatever the measure and independently of grade. The effect of length depends on lexicality: long pseudowords are read less accurately and more slowly than short ones, whereas long irregular words are read as well as short ones. Reading level (assessed by a French "gold standard" test) is mainly predicted by pseudoword reading skills, and also by phonemic awareness, for response times. The consistent structure (validity) of the tool is verified using a new statistical method: hierarchical classification of variables. The overall results underline the importance of considering response times in addition to accuracy in all assessments.

The purpose of the study was to investigate the influence of THRASS (Teaching Handwriting, Reading and Spelling Skills) on the word level accuracy skills of a group of grade 2 learners. Word level accuracy is one sub skill in learning to read and is an indicator of the word recognition abilities of the child. THRASS is a program that has been designed to systematically teach phonics and, thus, teaches the basic building blocks of word sounds and structure so as to improve the child’s decoding ability and word recognition ability. The research took place within the positivist paradigm and the methodology is quantitative in nature. The data collection method took the form of a one group pretest-posttest design, where a standardised reading test was administered prior to exposing the participants to the THRASS Program and then readministered one year later on the same group of learners. Data analysis took the form of statistical analysis to investigate any statistical significant difference in the word level accuracy skills of those Grade 2 learners. The result showed that over the period of a year the average reading accuracy age for the target population increased by four months. However, after statistical analysis the difference was not statistically significant. The Null Hypothesis that; exposing a group of Grade 2 learners to the THRASS Program for a period of one year will have no statistically significant influence on their word level accuracy skills cannot be rejected . However, the changes both in average reading accuracy as well as error patterns have inspired recommendations for further research. Copyright / Dissertation (MEd)--University of Pretoria, 2010. / Educational Psychology / unrestricted