Factors such as effective visual and auditive language acquisition are
essential for a learnerâs success at school, as learning problems are often
associated with reading and spelling problems. Research has shown that a
learner should receive mother tongue education until grade 7, due to the
direct link between a lack of mother tongue education and weak scholastic
achievement.
A good reading ability is seen as one of the most important scholastic abilities
for a learner to be able to develop to his full potential. Reading is an
advanced and intricate process, which includes reading abilities such as letter
discrimination, sound symbol association, word recognition, phrasing,
pronunciation, reading fluency and reading comprehension. Not one single
reading method will be effective for all learners and the majority of learners
will show progress when different methods are employed.
The reading and spelling processes are closely related to each other. The
spelling process is a more complex process and is reckoned as the highest
form of language ability. In order to spell, the learner depends on the ability to
store and recall the words he has read. Spelling problems can develop due to
a great variety of internal and/or external factors. There is no effective
education method for all learners with spelling problems and spelling should
be integrated when the learner is taught other language abilities.
A reading and spelling programme have been compiled to stimulate and
extend the learnersâ interest in both the written and oral use of their mother
tongue. A perceptual stimulation programme has also been included into the
study to expose the learners to the joy of perceptual stimulation. The reading
and spelling programme has been developed in such a way that it can be
used in addition to existing education methods. The sampling existed of an
experimental group (four subgroups) and a control group. The control group
has been chosen in the same way as the experimental group, but the control
group did not participate in the programme. The experimental and control
groups were paired according to their sex, age and pre-primary school
attendance to avoid the variance in the dependent variable, which is caused
by interference variables. In this way a more sensitive design and powerful
statistical test have been achieved. The Sesotho reading and spelling test
has been used in the evaluation of the grade 1 learnersâ reading and spelling
abilities, as no other standardized measure instrument is available for
Sesotho-speaking grade 1 learners.
The comparison group did not participate in the programme. The experimental and control
groups were paired according to their sex, age and pre-primary school
attendance to avoid the variance in the dependent variable, which is caused
by interference variables. In this way a more sensitive design and powerful
statistical test have been achieved. The Sesotho reading and spelling test
has been used in the evaluation of the grade 1 learnersâ reading and spelling
abilities, as no other standardized measure instrument is available for
Sesotho-speaking grade 1 learners.
The comparison between the means of the experimental and control groups
was verified calculated by using Hotellingâs T-squared (T²) test. The influence
of the experimenter has been shown according to the MANOVA-analysis.
The findings show that the reading and spelling scores of the experimental
group (four subgroups) can be compared and that the one presenterâs group
did not achieve significantly better than the other presenterâs group. The
results of the statistic calculations show that the programme can successfully
improve the reading and spelling ability of the Sesotho-speaking grade 1
learner.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:netd.ac.za/oai:union.ndltd.org:ufs/oai:etd.uovs.ac.za:etd-07272010-124736 |
| Date | 27 July 2010 |
| Creators | Koen, Margaretha Paulina |
| Contributors | Dr GS Kotzé, Dr KGF Esterhuyse, Prof CJ Kotzé |
| Publisher | University of the Free State |
| Source Sets | South African National ETD Portal |
| Language | en-uk |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Source | http://etd.uovs.ac.za//theses/available/etd-07272010-124736/restricted/ |
| Rights | unrestricted, I hereby certify that, if appropriate, I have obtained and attached hereto a written permission statement from the owner(s) of each third party copyrighted matter to be included in my thesis, dissertation, or project report, allowing distribution as specified below. I certify that the version I submitted is the same as that approved by my advisory committee. I hereby grant to University Free State or its agents the non-exclusive license to archive and make accessible, under the conditions specified below, my thesis, dissertation, or project report in whole or in part in all forms of media, now or hereafter known. I retain all other ownership rights to the copyright of the thesis, dissertation or project report. I also retain the right to use in future works (such as articles or books) all or part of this thesis, dissertation, or project report. |
Page generated in 0.0023 seconds