This study examined the oral language abilities of 100 English as-a-second-language (ESL) and 50 English as-a-first-language (EL1) students in grade 5 with and without reading disabilities. Students with reading disabilities were further divided into two groups: poor decoders and poor comprehenders. A MANOVA was conducted to determine the effect of language group and reading group on the students’ cognitive and linguistic skills. The ESL students demonstrated delays in receptive vocabulary as measured by the PPVT, but were comparable to EL1 students on all other measures. Significant differences were found between reading groups for both language groups. Normal readers performed significantly better than poor decoders and poor comprehenders on all of the oral language measures. The poor decoders performed significantly better than poor comprehenders on an oral language task assessing listening comprehension. This research demonstrates that students with reading difficulties also have difficulties in oral language proficiency, regardless of second language status.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:TORONTO/oai:tspace.library.utoronto.ca:1807/25662 |
| Date | 01 January 2011 |
| Creators | Massey-Garrison, Angela |
| Contributors | Geva, Esther |
| Source Sets | University of Toronto |
| Language | en_ca |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis |
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