THE EFFECT OF THE POSITION OF CONSONANTAL ELEMENTS IN WORDS ON SECOND LANGUAGE SPELLING AMONG GRADE TWO ENGLISH LANGUAGE LEARNERS WITH DIFFERENT ...
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THE EFFECT OF PHONEME POSITION ON L2 SPELLING
THE EFFECT OF THE POSITION OF CONSONANTAL
ELEMENTS IN WORDS ON SECOND LANGUAGE
SPELLING AMONG GRADE TWO ENGLISH LANGUAGE
LEARNERS WITH DIFFERENT HOME LANGUAGE
BACKGROUNDS
by
Sharmigaa Ragunathan
A thesis submitted in conformity with the requirements
for the degree of Master of Arts
Graduate Department of Applied Psychology and Human Development
Ontario Institute for Studies in Education
University of Toronto
© Copyright by Sharmigaa Ragunathan (2021)THE EFFECT OF PHONEME POSITION ON L2 SPELLING
THE EFFECT OF THE POSITION OF CONSONANTAL ELEMENTS
IN WORDS ON SECOND LANGUAGE SPELLING AMONG
GRADE TWO ENGLISH LANGUAGE LEARNERS WITH
DIFFERENT HOME LANGUAGE BACKGROUNDS
Master of Arts 2021
Sharmigaa Ragunathan
Department of Applied Psychology and Human Development
Ontario Institute for Studies in Education
University of Toronto
Abstract
This study investigated the role of development, phoneme position and first language (L1)
typology on second language (L2) spelling in grade two English Language Learners (ELLs)
coming from two typologically different home languages: alphabetic (Portuguese and Spanish,
N=83) and logographic (Chinese, N=81). The participants completed real and pseudoword
spelling, word reading and various cognitive tasks. Common to both groups was the observation
that (1) consonantal elements in the onset position were spelled more accurately than in the coda
position; and (2) singletons were spelled most accurately but they struggled with consonant
clusters and digraphs. Furthermore, L1 typology, dual-route model of spelling and home literacy
practices jointly explained how the logographic group made more errors on consonantal elements
absent in their L1 when spelling pseudowords, but spelled real words more accurately compared
to the alphabetic group. Educational and clinical implications of assessing ELLs’ spelling skills
in early grades are discussed.
iiTHE EFFECT OF PHONEME POSITION ON L2 SPELLING
Acknowledgements
I would like to first thank my supportive and insightful supervisor, Dr. Esther Geva, for
believing in my potential for the past two years. My thesis would not have been possible without
her guidance and advice. Her expertise in the development of literacy and language skills of
second language learners was an asset to my thesis.
I would like to acknowledge some individuals for their assistance throughout my thesis
journey. First, I appreciate the hard work and dedication of my fellow Research Assistants,
Abishana Ilanges, Andriea A. Swampillai, Anita Mazumdar-Moscato, Ayda Ferdossifard, Danlin
Kris Song, Jiao Fu, Maryen Lieu, Naziha Ullah, Qiutong Zhou, Sayantha Baskaran, and Ufuoma
Deborah Ajari, during the data entry and coding phase. Second, I am grateful for Dr. Olesya
Falunchuk’s expertise in research methods and data analysis when consulting to her about data
analysis. Third, I would like to thank Dr. Yoonjung Kang, my undergraduate research advisor,
for her time and feedback during the initial stages of my thesis with her specialization in
phonology.
Most importantly, I would like to thank my family and friends for cheering me on and
supporting me with my thesis journey with their words of encouragements for the past two years.
A special shoutout to my mother and sister for motivating me and believing in me.
iiiTHE EFFECT OF PHONEME POSITION ON L2 SPELLING
Table of Contents
Abstract ii
Acknowledgments iii
List of tables vi
List of appendices vii
Introduction 1
Literature Review 1
Developmental Aspects of Spelling 1
A Comparison of English and Targeted Languages’ Linguistics Features 3
L2 Spelling 6
Word Position and L2 Spelling 8
Oral Language and L2 Spelling 9
The Present Study 10
Methods 11
Participants 11
Materials 13
Cognitive Processing 13
Phonological Processing 14
Decoding 14
English Proficiency 15
Spelling 15
Pseudoword Spelling Scoring System 16
Results 18
Overview 18
Accurate representation of singletons, consonant clusters, and digraphs in 19
the onset and coda positions by the alphabetic and logographic groups
Was there a main and interaction effect for language group, word position 19
and consonantal elements observed?
Did spelling error types vary as a function of home language? 21
Comparison of the Alphabetic and Logographic Groups on Cognitive 23
Processing, Phonological Processing, Decoding, Vocabulary Knowledge,
and Spelling Skills
Was there a main and interaction effect between language group and spelling? 25
ivTHE EFFECT OF PHONEME POSITION ON L2 SPELLING
Discussion 25
General Trends of L2 Spelling among the Alphabetic and Logographic 25
Groups
Considering Jointly L2 Spelling from the Perspective of L1 Typology 26
Difference, Dual-Route Model and Home Literacy Practices
Limitations and Future Directions for Research 30
Implications 31
References 33
vTHE EFFECT OF PHONEME POSITION ON L2 SPELLING
List of Tables
Table 1. Representation of Consonantal Elements in Onset and Coda of 19
Pseudoword Spelling: Descriptive Statistics and MANOVA by
Language Group
Table 2. The Role of Language Group, Consonantal Element and Word 20
Position in Pseudoword Spelling: Repeated Measure ANOVA
Summary Table
Table 3. Spelling Errors as a Function of Element and Word Position: 22
Descriptive Statistics and Multivariate ANOVA by Language Group
Table 4. Comparison of Cognitive Processing, Phonological Processing, 24
Decoding, English Proficiency and Spelling Skills: Descriptive
Statistics and MANOVA by Language Group
Table 5. The Effect of Language Group and Spelling Task Type on L2 25
Spelling: Repeated Measure ANOVA Summary Table
viTHE EFFECT OF PHONEME POSITION ON L2 SPELLING
List of Appendices
Appendix A. English, Portuguese, Spanish and Chinese Comparison of 43
Phonological Features
Appendix B. Real Word Spelling List 44
Appendix C. Pseudoword Spelling List 44
Appendix D. Spelling Error Coding System 45
Appendix E. Examples of Spelling Errors Made by the Alphabetic and 49
Logographic Groups
viiTHE EFFECT OF PHONEME POSITION ON L2 SPELLING 1
Introduction
Spelling is a foundational writing skill that helps to convey messages and ideas (Cook,
1992; Al-Sobhi, Rashid, Abdullah & Darmi, 2017). Spelling is complex in nature as it involves a
number of component skills such as phonology (sound), orthography (writing system) and
morphology (form of words) (Staden, 2010; Treiman & Bourassa, 2000). Research has
demonstrated the contribution of spelling to literacy skills such as reading and writing (Lindner,
2019). For instance, spelling accuracy predicts reading development among both monolingual
and bilingual children (Caravolas, Hulme & Snowling, 2001; Ehri, 2000; Lindner, 2019).
Treiman (1999) noted that spelling can improve one’s ability to decode novel and unfamiliar
words, thus resulting in positive gains in children’s reading ability. Furthermore, children who
struggle with spelling face a cognitive load in writing tasks. As a result, poor spelling skills
impede other aspects of writing such as writing fluency, grammar and the content of writing
(Ehri, 2000).
While there is ample research demonstrating the impact of spelling on various literacy
skills, less is known on spelling development of English Language Learners (ELLs) compared to
what is known about spelling skills of English monolingual speakers (EL1s) (Geva & Lafrance,
2011; Treiman, 1993). Spelling is often used as an additional measure of literacy rather than
being the main variable of interest (Lesaux, Rupp & Siegel, 2007). Therefore, it is important to
gain additional insight into this essential writing component in ELLs.
Literature Review
Developmental Aspects of Spelling
English has the following three consonantal elements: (1) singletons: a single phoneme
that is represented by a single letter (e.g., the phoneme /n/ in neck); (2) consonant clusters: aTHE EFFECT OF PHONEME POSITION ON L2 SPELLING 2
group of two or more consonants (e.g. s and t together form the consonant cluster st as seen in
the word stop); and (3) digraphs: one phoneme that is represented by two letters (e.g., the
phoneme th or /θ/ in thick); Both monolingual and bilingual children appear to have more
difficulties with spelling consonant clusters and digraphs compared to singletons as they learn
how to spell in the early grades (Goswami, 1992; Groff, 1986). For instance, Wade-Woolley and
Siegel (1997) demonstrated that consonant clusters were equally difficult for EL1 and ELL
children coming from various home language backgrounds. Furthermore, Russak and Kahn-
Horwitz (2015) demonstrated that fifth grade Hebrew English as a Foreign Language (EFL)
learners who were poor spellers struggled with representing consonant clusters. However, these
children’s representation of consonant clusters improved by the eighth grade. Russak and Kahn-
Horwitz (2015) explained that representing two consecutive phonemes with two separate
graphemes is initially challenging for children but that this challenge gradually disappears.
Wang and Geva (2003b) demonstrated that digraphs (e.g., [θ], sh ([ʃ]), ck) were
developmentally challenging in grade two for both EL1 and ELL children with Cantonese as
their first language (L1). They explained that digraphs involve learning and recalling that two
specific letters represent a single phoneme (e.g., the letters t and h in combination represent the
[θ] phoneme) (Wang & Geva, 2003b). At the same time, it is worth noting that Cantonese as L1
children had more difficulties representing the [θ], [ʃ], and ck digraphs in a spelling dictation task
compared to EL1s because the phonemes represented by these digraphs are absent in the Chinese
language. As their proficiency in English increased over time, their representation of these
digraphs became more accurate and their performance was similar to their L1 counterparts. Thus,
segmentation and representation of both of these multi-lettered blends are a challenge for young
monolingual and bilingual children from a young age (Groff, 1986; Werfel & Schule, 2012).THE EFFECT OF PHONEME POSITION ON L2 SPELLING 3
With increased exposure to consonant clusters and digraphs as part of learning to read and write
in English (either as L1 or as second language, or L2), they begin to remember them as chunks
rather than individual letters, and as a result they would be able to accurately represent them
(Groff, 1986).
A Comparison of English, Portuguese, Spanish and Chinese Phonological Features
The objective of this thesis is to understand how features of the L1 (spoken and written)
may contribute to spelling errors committed by young ELLs. Therefore, this section provides a
comparison of English and the following targeted languages in this study: Portuguese, Spanish
and Chinese. This section is summarized in Appendix A.
According to the Orthographic Depth Hypothesis, languages vary in terms of the degree
of “depth” of orthography (Katz & Frost, 1992). English, Spanish and Portuguese are associated
with alphabetic writing system whereby graphemes (letters) are mapped onto phonemes
(sounds), thus they are phonological in nature (Caravolas & Samara, 2015). These three
languages are also associated with the same alphabet (Simpson, Mousikou, Montoya, & Defior,
2013). Spanish and Portuguese have a consistent, “shallow” one-to-one grapheme-phoneme
correspondence spelling system. English orthography on the other hand has a “deep” inconsistent
grapheme-phoneme mapping. In English (1) a grapheme can stand for more than one phoneme
(e.g., c à /k/, /s/); and (2) a phoneme can be represented by more than one grapheme (e.g., /k/ à
c, ck, k). (Defior, Martos & Luz, 2002). Unlike the three languages described above, Chinese is a
“logographic” orthography where a character represents a meaning unit and each character is a
single morpheme and a single syllable (e.g., 月 à moon; 木 à tree) (Caravolas & Samara,
2015; Ehrich & Meuter, 2009; Wang & Geva, 2003a). In other words, Chinese is a “deep”
orthography. Recognizing Chinese characters involves visual and rote-memorization (Katz &THE EFFECT OF PHONEME POSITION ON L2 SPELLING 4
Frost, 1992), whereas reading words in Portuguese, Spanish and to a large extent also English
can be achieved by mapping systematically letters to phonemes.
Even English Spanish and Portuguese orthography that utilize the Latin alphabet vary in
their phonological features. Specifically, English has 21 singletons (b, c, d, f, g, h, j, k, l, m, n, p,
q, r, s, t, v, w, x, y, z). Spanish has 15 singleton consonants (b, d, f, j, k, l, m, n, ñ, p, s, t, v, w, z)
while Portuguese has 17 singleton consonants (b, c, ç, d, f, g, j, l, m, n, p, r, s, t, v, w, z) (Defior,
Martos, & Cary, 2002). Chinese has 17 singletons (f, h, j, k, kh, l, m, n, ŋ, p, ph, s, t, th, w, ts, tsh)
(Chang, 2001; Holm & Dodd, 1999). However, it is worth noting that some dialects of Chinese
do not have /n/, therefore they may have difficulties distinguishing /n/ from /l/ (night vs. light)
(Chang, 2001). Unlike English, Spanish and Portuguese, Chinese does not possess voiced
singleton stops (b, d, g) and fricatives (z, v) (Lin & Johnson, 2010).
English has digraphs and some of the common ones include ch, [ʃ], and [θ] (Horwitz,
Schwartz & Share, 2011). Spanish and Portuguese have very few digraphs (e.g., Spanish- ch, ll,
rr, qu; Portuguese- gu, lh, nh, qu, rr, ss) (Defior, Martos, & Cary, 2002). Spanish doesn’t have
the [ʃ] phoneme, but it is a variant of ch in some dialects of Spanish (Hualde, Olarrea & Escobar,
2007). Spanish doesn’t have the [θ] phoneme, but c is pronounced as [θ] when c is followed by
certain vowels (Defior, Martos, & Cary, 2002). Portuguese also does not have the [ʃ] phoneme,
but the letters s and z are pronounced as [ʃ] depending on the context in which these letters occur
in words (Mesquita, Carvalhais, Limpo, & Castro, 2020). The phoneme [θ] does not exist in
Portuguese (Diena-Khayyat, 2000). Obviously, Chinese, which is not an alphabetic orthography,
has no digraphs (Wang & Geva, 2003a).
English has complex syllable patterns (e.g., CV, VC, CVC, CVCC, CCVC, CCV, CCVCC,
CCCVCC). The CCC stands for three-lettered consonant clusters, CC stands for two-letteredTHE EFFECT OF PHONEME POSITION ON L2 SPELLING 5
consonant clusters and digraphs and C stands for singletons. Portuguese and Spanish syllables
can consist of CV, VC, CVC, CCVC structures (Lahoz, 2012; Madureira, 2020). Both Spanish
and Portuguese allow the following consonant clusters in the word-initial, or onset position: bl,
br, cl, cr, fl, fr, gl, gr, pl, pr, tl, and tr (Madureira, 2020; Zaretsky, 2020). Furthermore, both
languages do not permit consonant clusters that consist of s + C (e.g., sp and st). These cluster
combinations are present in the English language. Spanish and Portuguese use vowel epenthesis
to separate the cluster to separate syllables (e.g., stop à es’top). Chinese, on the other hand, has
a simple syllable CV and CVC structure whereby singletons only represent consonants (Lin &
Johnson, 2010). Chinese does not permit consonant clusters in either onset or word-final (i.e.,
coda) positions. When Chinese speakers speak English, they either insert vowels to break down
the consonant cluster to separate phonemes (e.g., spoon à si’poon) or drop one of the
consonants to simplify the structure (e.g., play à pay, lay; nest à nes, net) (Chang, 2001). Each
of these four language groups allow certain singletons in the coda position. English allows all
singletons except for j, q and v in the word final position. Spanish only allows the following
singletons in the word final position: l, d, n and s (Zaretsky, 2020). Portuguese allows the
following singletons in word final position: 1, n, r and s (Cardoso, 2011). Chinese allows n and ŋ
at the end of words (Yip, 2014).
It is clear from this brief overview that phonological differences between one’s L1 and
L2 might affect specific L2 spelling components. In other words, Portuguese, Spanish and
Chinese ELLs may struggle with representing accurately in spelling specific elements of English
words that are absent in their L1. The following section elaborates on this notion.THE EFFECT OF PHONEME POSITION ON L2 SPELLING 6
L2 Spelling
Learning to spell in L2 is affected by the phonological and orthographic features of one’s
L1. According to Lado's (1957) contrastive hypothesis, individuals rely on the knowledge they
have acquired in their L1 when they learn the L2 through transfer of the principle underlying
spelling. Transfer can be positive when features of the L1 are relevant to the L2 learning due to
overlap in L1 and L2 features. Transfer can be negative when the L1 and L2 features are
different from each other and therefore are associated with specific difficulties in L2 learning
(Lado, 1970; Chung, Chen & Geva, 2019).
Research has addressed the process of transfer in the development of spelling among L2
learners coming from different ELL groups (e.g., Chinese: Wang & Geva, 2003a; Arabic: Allaith
& Joshi, 2011; Spanish: Fashola, Drum, Mayer & Kang, 1996 and Zaretsky, 2020; Welsh:
James, Scholfield, Garrett & Griffiths, 1993; Persian: Arab-Moghaddam & Sénéchal 2001). For
instance, Wang and Geva (2003a) found that Chinese ELL children made phonological errors or
imprecise phonological representation of phonemes absent in their L1 such as digraphs
[θ] and [ʃ] in a spelling dictation task by replacing [θ] with s, f, or z, and by replacing [ʃ] with s.
Likewise, Arabic ELL participants in Allaith and Joshi (2011)’s study made phonological errors
in English spelling words that involved replacing the phonemes /p/ and /v/ with /b/ and /f/
respectively as /p/ and /v/ are absent in their L1. In these studies, the phonological errors are
better explained by “negative transfer” whereby the children replaced phonemes absent in their
language with a closely matched phoneme in their L1 (Allaith and Joshi, 2011; Wang & Geva,
2003a). The spelling errors of Spanish ELL children in both Durgunoğlu (2002) and Fashola et al
(1996)’s studies reflected a phonological “sounding out” strategy given that Spanish is an
alphabetic language. A recent study (Zaretsky, 2020) investigated English spelling acquisition ofTHE EFFECT OF PHONEME POSITION ON L2 SPELLING 7
Spanish ELLs with varying word reading levels using a nonword spelling test. As noted in other
studies, the spelling errors that children made reflected negative transfer of their L1 phonology
and orthography. For example, Spanish as L1 readers misrepresented consonants that are not
available in Spanish (e.g., j in place of y; full for thull) and vowels (e.g., snop for snup). Spanish
nonreaders misrepresented digraphs (e.g., sheck for shesk), and both Spanish readers and
nonreaders applied vowel epenthesis in consonant clusters (e.g., yarba for yarb).
In addition to negative transfer, L2 (and L1) spelling could be affected by strategies
present in one’s L1 and it is explained by the dual-route model of spelling where spelling is
accomplished by one of the two routes: lexical and phonological route (Grainger & Ziegler,
2011; Treiman, 2017). The lexical route, also known as the semantic route, involves the retrieval
of whole words from memory (Castles, Holmes & Wong, 1997; Treiman, 2017). The nonlexical
or phonological route involves the conversion of phonemes to graphemes through a sounding out
strategy (Castles, Holmes & Wong, 1997; Treiman, 2017). Wang and Geva (2003b) compared
the English spelling performance of EL1 and Chinese ELL children using two spelling dictation
tasks: (1) real word spelling that contained 16 highly frequent English words; and (2)
phonological pseudoword spelling that contained 16 nonwords that resembled English word
structures. Wang and Geva (2003b) found that Chinese children performed better on the real
word spelling task compared to the English children, as the Chinese children were able to rely on
visual lexical route present in their L1 when retrieving real words. However, the Chinese
children struggled with the pseudoword spelling task as it required a phonological “sounding
out” strategy that is absent in their L1 (Wang & Geva, 2003b). In another relevant study that
demonstrates the effects of L1 orthography on L2 spelling, Dixon, Zhao and Joshi (2010)
compared the nature of real-word spelling errors of ELL children who came from Chinese,THE EFFECT OF PHONEME POSITION ON L2 SPELLING 8
Malay or Tamil as L1 background. These three groups represent orthographically different
groups, as Chinese is logographic while the orthographies of Malay and Tamil are alphabetic and
syllabic, respectively. Chinese children made significantly more real-word substitution errors
(e.g., he à here, his, has; green à teen) while the Malay and Tamil children made significantly
more phonological errors (e.g., he à ki- consonant substitution; green à grnn- vowel is omitted
but consonants presented in the same order).
Word Position and L2 Spelling
English hierarchical syllable structure is widely accepted by many linguistics and
psycholinguists (Treiman, 1993; Treiman & Kessler, 1995). It consists of two major
subunits: onset and rime. The onset is the “initial consonant portion of the syllable”. The rime is
a phonological unit that consists of a nucleus (i.e., vowel- V) and a “coda”, that is the final-
consonant portion of the syllable (Treiman, 1993). Consonantal elements, in both the onset and
coda positions, include singletons (e.g., rich, broom- C), consonant clusters (e.g., stop, fist- CC)
and digraphs (e.g., thin, wish- CC).
Some studies examined the effect of the position of the consonantal element position on
spelling. Lewkowicz (1986) found that the position of phonemes in words affects spelling
performance. Studies focusing on spelling development demonstrate that both EL1 and ELL
children represent the onset in words more accurately than the coda (for EL1s see Stage &
Wagner, 1993; for Taiwanese ELLs see Hong & Chen, 2009). Importantly, Yeung and Qiao
(2019) observed this pattern among both typically developing and at-risk EL1 and ELLs with
Chinese as L1 kindergarten children. According to Treiman (1993), the suprasegmental feature
of stress within the syllable could account for these differences. Elements in the stressed position
of the word are more salient than the ones in the unstressed (final) position (Treiman et al, 1993).THE EFFECT OF PHONEME POSITION ON L2 SPELLING 9
For example, when pronouncing the word cat, the /k/ is more emphasized than the/æt/. In
English, the syllable structure is stress-timed based, as it is made up of both stressed and
unstressed elements (Holliman et al, 2010). Typically, stress is more salient in the onset position
of a single syllabled word (Mehta, Ding, Ness & Chen, 2018). Furthermore, phonemes in the
onset position require least processing in comparison with later appearing segments of the
syllable (i.e., coda) (e.g., in the word cat, /k/ is more likely to be recalled easily compared to /t/).
This is known as the serial position effect (Stage and Wagner, 1992). Taken together, regardless
of language status (EL1 or ELL), children are more likely to represent accurately onset than coda
elements in one-syllable words because of its saliency.
Oral Language and L2 Spelling
Conclusions pertaining to the role of oral language proficiency and L2 spelling are
mixed. For instance, Wade-Woolley and Siegel (1997) found that L2 oral language (assessed
with oral cloze and syntactic judgment) did not contribute to the spelling performance of 79 ESL
children’s spelling accuracy coming from different L1 backgrounds (i.e., Cantonese, Mandarin,
Tamil, Gujarati, Urdu and Punjabi). On the other hand, Marinova-Todd and Hall (2013)
compared the role of L2 oral language proficiency in L2 English spelling skills of first grade
Tagalog and Cantonese bilingual children using pseudoword spelling. Tagalog is a shallow
alphabetic language while Cantonese is a deep logographic language. The authors found that L2
oral language proficiency has a stronger association with L2 spelling in the Tagalog language
group compared to the Chinese language group, despite similarities in their English proficiency.
Marinova-Todd and Hall (2013) concluded that “oral language proficiency seems to be a
stronger predictor of literacy ability in bilingual populations whose L1 is an alphabetic language
with shallow orthography”.THE EFFECT OF PHONEME POSITION ON L2 SPELLING 10
The Present Study
The objective of the present study was to compare the effect of phoneme position
associated with three different consonantal elements (i.e., singletons, consonant clusters,
digraphs) on L2 spelling accuracy in Grade 2 ELLs coming from two distinct orthographic
groups: alphabetic (Portuguese and Spanish) and logographic (Chinese). This objective addresses
some limitations in previous studies. First, although research has shown that ELLs represent
phonemes more accurately in the onset than in coda position, ELL studies have focused
primarily on spelling words that contain only singletons in word-initial and word-final positions.
It is not clear whether such findings can be generalized to consonant clusters and digraphs.
Furthermore, previous studies demonstrated that EL1 children acquired and represented both
singleton and consonant clusters more accurately in the onset position than in the coda position
(e.g., Werfel & Schule, 2012; Levelt, Schiller & Levelt, 2000). However, it is crucial to examine
whether these findings can be extended to ELLs. Second, there are limited studies that compared
simultaneously the developing spelling skills of ELLs coming from typologically different
language backgrounds (Figueredo, 2006). Addressing these questions should be helpful from a
theoretical and applied perspectives. The focus was on comparing spelling patterns and spelling
error patterns across typologically different home languages such as the logographic Chinese and
alphabetic, Latin-based, languages such as Spanish and Portuguese by using a pseudoword
spelling task. To rule out group differences on cognitive-linguistics skills, the alphabetic and
logographic groups were compared on cognitive processing (e.g., nonverbal ability, rapid letter
naming), phonological processing (e.g., word and nonword segmentation, and auditory
discrimination), decoding (e.g., word reading and pseudoword reading) and English proficiency
skills (e.g., vocabulary knowledge).THE EFFECT OF PHONEME POSITION ON L2 SPELLING 11
Based on previous literature, it was hypothesized that:
(1) both the alphabetic and logographic groups would represent singletons,
consonant clusters and digraphs more accurately in the onset position of CCVC and
CVCC syllables than in the coda position;
(2) both the alphabetic and logographic groups would represent singletons most
accurately, followed by consonant clusters, with digraphs being the most difficult; and
(3) The L2 spelling performance of the alphabetic and logographic groups would
reflect their L1 structural features. More specifically, it was expected that the alphabetic
group would perform better than the logographic group on the pseudoword spelling task
due their relative advantage in accessing the phonological route (i.e., segmentation and
sounding out of alphabets in words) present in their L1. It was expected that the
logographic group would perform more poorly than the alphabetic groups due to: (1) the
absence of the phonological route in their L1 writing system, given that Chinese words
are learned through a lexical, whole word strategy; (2) systematic exposure to Chinese
orthography at home through TV and attendance in heritage Chinese classes.
Methodology
Participants
Data for the study come from a large longitudinal study that assessed cognitive,
linguistics and cognitive skills of ELLs coming from three home language backgrounds (i.e.,
Portuguese, Spanish and Chinese). They were recruited from 22 elementary schools in Southern
Ontario, Canada. The study consisted of two cohorts. The first cohort consisted of children who
were followed from senior kindergarten (age 5-6) to grade 4 (age 9-10), and the second cohortTHE EFFECT OF PHONEME POSITION ON L2 SPELLING 12
consisted of children who were recruited 2 years later and were followed from grade 1 (age 6-7)
to grade 4. The focus of the present study is on grade 2 spelling data across both cohorts
(N=187). 16 of the participants dropped out between grades 1 and 2. This drop was associated
with home relocation. In addition, six students had missing scores on at least one measure due to
being absent during testing and one student did not complete the pseudoword spelling task. To
determine whether attrition was at random, Little’s MCAR test was conducted. Analyses
revealed that the attrited students did not differ statistically from the remaining participants on
L1, gender, age, school, or any of the cognitive processing, phonological processing, decoding,
English proficiency, and spelling (real-word and pseudoword) measures administered when they
were in grade 2: Little’s MCAR test: Chi Square=74.330, p=.402. Given that the six students
completed the pseudoword spelling task, missing scores were calculated through imputation.
The final sample consisted of 164 participants. They were grouped based on their L1
orthography: 83 alphabetic (Portuguese, N=22; Spanish, N=61) and 81 logographic (Chinese, N=
81). The Portuguese and Spanish groups were merged because both languages have an alphabetic
orthography and are Romance languages, thus they have similar phonology, syntax and
vocabulary. To statistically justify the alphabetic group merging, Box’s M test was used to
determine whether the covariance matrices are equal by using all measures. The test was not
significant: Box’s M= 93.030; p= .247; there were no significant differences in the covariance
matrices among the Portuguese and Spanish groups. The mean age of testing was 92.84 months
(SD=3.998 months) for the alphabetic group and 91.98 months (SD=4.162 months) for the
logographic group. Gender was evenly distributed across both groups. All participants had
attended a school in Ontario since kindergarten. The logographic group came from a higher
socio-economic status (SES) background conceptualized in terms of parental education level,THE EFFECT OF PHONEME POSITION ON L2 SPELLING 13
compared to the alphabetic group. Parents of children in the logographic group attained a
university degree while parents of children in the alphabetic group completed high school (Grant,
Gottardo & Geva, 2011; Jean, 2011). At home, the logographic group spent more time reading
books and watching television shows in their L1, as well as reading English books compared to
the alphabetic group while both groups spent about the same amount of time watching English
television shows.1 Moreover, attendance in L1 heritage classes was more prevalent in the
logographic group.
Materials
The measures described in this section were used to establish group equivalence. The
spelling measures were administered as a group while other measures were done individually.
Cognitive Processing
Nonverbal Reasoning. The Matrix Analogy Test (MAT) (Naglieri, 1989) assessed
nonverbal ability. The MAT design consists of 64 abstract designs of the standard progressive
matrix type. Participants were shown a picture of a missing piece and were asked to choose one
of five options that completes the pattern. The reported reliability, as measured by Cronbach’s
alpha, is .94 for children aged 8 (Naglieri, 1985).
Rapid Automatized Letter Naming. Rapid automatized naming (RAN) of letters
(Wagner, Torgesen & Rashotte, 1999) measures the speed (in seconds) and accuracy of
children’s retrieval of 5 letters that appear ten times in random order. Cronbach’s alpha is .72 for
8-year-old English speaking children (Wagner, Torgesen & Rashotte, 1999)2.
__________________________
1
Note, questions about heritage languages and time spent reading and watching television in English and the
participants’ L1 at home were asked in a demographic questionnaire given to the participants’ parent or guardian to
complete (in their home language). However, not all of the parents and guardians completed the questionnaires.
2
Note, the Cronbach alpha of RAN was calculated with the English-speaking children by the authors of CTOPP.THE EFFECT OF PHONEME POSITION ON L2 SPELLING 14
Phonological Processing
Word Segmentation. The Word Segmentation subtest of the Comprehension Test of
Phonological Processing (CTOPP) (Wagner, Torgesen & Rashotte, 1999) assesses the ability to
separate words to individual phonemes. Participants were asked to say one sound at a time after
hearing each word. The Cronbach’s alpha is .98 and .89 for the alphabetic and logographic
groups, respectively.
Nonword Segmentation. The Nonword Segmentation subtest of CTOPP (Wagner,
Torgesen & Rashotte, 1999) assesses the ability to separate nonwords to individual phonemes.
Participants were asked to say one sound at a time after hearing each nonword. The reliability, as
measured by Cronbach’s alpha, is .89 and .90 for the alphabetic and logographic groups,
respectively.
Auditory Discrimination. The auditory discrimination task assesses the ability to decide
whether two nonwords varying in one phoneme are the same or not (e.g., bish-biss; nush-nush).
Participants heard 34 recorded pairs and were asked to indicate for each pair whether the
nonwords pairs were the same or different. The sound varied either in the word-initial or word
final-position. Sixteen nonword pairs were” the same” and 18 nonword pairs were “different”.
One point was given for each correctly identified pair. The Cronbach’s alpha is .71 and .61 for
the alphabetic and logographic groups, respectively.
Decoding
Word reading. The Word Identification subtest of Woodcock Reading Mastery Tests-
Revised (WRMT-R) (Woodcock, 1987) assesses the ability to read words. The reported reliability
ranged from .85 to .95 for English-speaking children (Woodcock, 1987)3.
__________________________
3
Note, the Cronbach’s alpha for Word Reading was calculated with the English-speaking children by the authors of
WRMT-R.THE EFFECT OF PHONEME POSITION ON L2 SPELLING 15
Pseudoword Reading. The Word Attack subtest of WRMT-R (Woodcock, 1987) assesses
the ability to apply appropriate grapheme-phoneme correspondences to read nonwords that
resemble English word structures. The reported reliability, as measured by Cronbach’s alpha, is
.91 for English-speaking children (Woodcock, 1987)4.
English Proficiency
Vocabulary Knowledge. Vocabulary knowledge was measured using the Peabody Picture
Vocabulary Test Third Edition – Form B (PPVT III; Dunn & Dunn, 1997). Children listened to a
word spoken by the task administrator and pointed to one of four picture which corresponded to
that word. The words become increasingly less common. The PPVT-R is considered to be a
reliable and valid test of receptive vocabulary with Cronbach’s alpha coefficient of .95 for
children aged 7 (Dunn & Dunn, 1997).
Spelling
Real Word Spelling. The real-word spelling dictation task assessed knowledge of English
words. The spelling list consisted of 16 highly frequent words in the English. The participants
heard the word in isolation, then in a sentence, and again in isolation. One point was awarded
for each correctly spelled word. The Cronbach’s alpha is .89 and .93 for the alphabetic and
logographic groups, respectively. The items are listed in Appendix B.
Pseudoword Spelling. The pseudoword spelling task consisted of 16 one-syllable
nonwords that resembled English word structure. Half of the pseudowords had a consonant-
vowel-consonant-consonant (CVCC) word structure, and the other half had a consonant-
consonant-vowel-consonant (CCVC) word structure. The items and pronunciations are listed in
Appendix C.
__________________________
4
Note, the Cronbach’s alpha for Pseudoword Reading was calculated with the English-speaking children by the
authors of WRMT-R.THE EFFECT OF PHONEME POSITION ON L2 SPELLING 16
Pseudoword Spelling Scoring System
Existing studies typically analyze children’s spelling performance holistically, as correct
and incorrect production of the whole word (Masterson & Apel, 2010). However, this approach
does not capture children’s subtle growth in spelling accuracy of specific linguistics elements in
words (Masterson & Apel, 2010; Tangel & Blachman, 1992). Therefore, this study assessed
pseudoword spelling performance by adding total accurate representation of different linguistics
elements across all nonwords in the dictation task. Specifically, both the onset and coda of each
pseudoword were scored separately, with a score of 1 for correct and 0 for incorrect. To get a
correct score, the right consonantal element must be written in the correct word position, as
dictated in the spelling task. Total spelling performance scores was obtained by adding the
accurately represented onset and coda across 16 pseudowords, with a maximum score of 32. The
reliability, as measured by Cronbach’s alpha, are .93 and .90 for the alphabetic and logographic
groups, respectively.
The second approach focused on examining the accuracy of representing the three
consonantal elements in onset and coda positions to investigate the effect of word position on L2
spelling. The scores were divided into six groups: singleton onset, singleton coda, consonant
cluster onset, consonant cluster coda, digraph onset, and digraph coda. The maximum score for
single consonant groups was eight and both consonant cluster and digraph groups were four. For
instance, digraph onset score is obtained by adding accurate representation in the following four
pseudowords that have a digraph in the onset position, (theg, thop, shen and sheb); (See
pseudowords in Appendix C).
Lastly, a more sophisticated and detailed coding system was used to classify the spelling
errors made in the onset and coda for each of the pseudowords separately. This coding systemTHE EFFECT OF PHONEME POSITION ON L2 SPELLING 17 was informed by previous studies (Al-Sobhi, Rashid, Abdullah & Darmi, 2017; Bebout, 1985; Nolan, 2007; Protopapas, Fakou, Styliani, Skaloumbakas and Mouzaki, 2013; Treiman and Bourassa, 2000).The errors are coded to one of the following major orthographic categories: omission of elements, letter strings, consonant doubling, single letter representation (e.g., singleton-phoneme substitution; consonant cluster and digraph reduction to a single letter), representation of two letters other than intended consonant cluster and digraph letters, position misplacement, and correct. The letter strings, consonant doubling, single letter representation, representation of two letters other than intended consonant cluster and digraph letters and position misplacement categories have phonological error subcategories that involve representing phonemes either related or unrelated to the intended singleton, consonant cluster and digraph. The research assistants were provided with a list of phonologically related elements to the intended singleton, consonant cluster and digraph. The error types were assigned to their numerical code, ranging from 1 to 54, based on the consonantal elements. The detailed coding scheme is found in Appendix D. The interrater reliability for the error coding system was established between the author and two research assistants for the onset and coda positions for all 16 words separately using Cohen’s kappa. The reliability coding errors types in the onset position of all 16 words were between .87 and 1.00. The reliability coding for the coda position of all 16 words ranged from .86 and 1.00. Disagreements were primarily due to rating whether the incorrect phoneme was related to the intended element or not (e.g., single letter-random substitution vs. single letter-nonrandom substitution) and orthographic categories (e.g., omission vs. misposition of elements, as well as string of letters vs. two letter representation and string of letters vs. vowel insertion for both consonant cluster and digraphs).
THE EFFECT OF PHONEME POSITION ON L2 SPELLING 18
Results
The Effect of Phoneme Position on L2 Spelling Accuracy in the Alphabetic and
Logographic Groups
Overview
The objective of this study was to compare the effect of phoneme position (i.e., onset and
coda) on three different consonantal elements (i.e., singletons, consonant clusters and digraphs)
on L2 spelling accuracy. To investigate the first and second hypothesis (i.e., the developmental
aspect and positional effect of L2 spelling), multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) was
conducted with language group (i.e., alphabetic, logographic) as the between-subject variable to
compare the means of accurate representation scores of the three consonantal elements in both
onset and coda positions that are presented in Table 1. In addition, Table 2 focuses on the main
and interaction effects of language group, consonantal element and word position using repeated
measures analysis of variance (ANOVA). To investigate the third hypothesis (i.e., the
typological difference and L1 dual-route model to spelling), MANOVA was conducted with
language group (i.e., alphabetic, logographic) as between-subject variables to compare means of
spelling errors that were significantly different between the alphabetic and logographic groups in
Table 3 as well as the means of cognitive processing, phonological processing, decoding, English
proficiency and spelling skills in Table 4. Raw scores of nonverbal reasoning, RAN, word
segmentation, nonword segmentation, word reading, pseudoword reading, and vocabulary
knowledge were used because standardized norms of these measures were established for
English as L1 monolingual samples and may not be reliable for ELL children. The raw scores of
real and pseudoword spelling were converted to z-scores to investigate the main and interactionTHE EFFECT OF PHONEME POSITION ON L2 SPELLING 19
effects between spelling task type (i.e., real and pseudoword spelling) and language group on L2
spelling using repeated measures ANOVA as presented in Table 5.
Accurate representation of singletons, consonant clusters, and digraphs in onset and coda
positions by the alphabetic and logographic groups
As can be seen in Table 1, the alphabetic group represented the following two elements
significantly more accurately than the logographic group: consonant cluster onset (F (1,162) =
4.421, p < .05, η2=.027), and digraph onset (F (1,162) = 5.957, p < .01, η2=.035). However, the
alphabetic and logographic groups’ scores on singleton onset were not statistically different from
each other (F (1, 162) = .948, p > .05, η2=.006). Likewise, the alphabetic and logographic
groups’ accurate representation of all three elements in codas did not differ: singleton (F (1, 162)
= 1.883, p > .05, η2=.011), consonant cluster (F (1, 162) = 2.919, p > .05, η2=.018), and digraph
F (1, 162) = 2.175, p > .05, η2=.013).
Table 1. Representation of Consonantal Elements in Onset and Coda of Pseudoword Spelling:
Descriptive Statistics and MANOVA by Language Group
Alphabetic Logographic
(N=83) (N=81)
Consonantal Element and M SD M SD F (Language Partial η2
Position Group)
Singleton Onset (/8) 6.93 1.800 6.67 1.628 .948 .006
Singleton Coda (/8) 5.18 2.354 4.68 2.328 1.883 .011
Consonant Cluster Onset (/4) 3.29 1.255 2.83 1.547 4.421* .027
Consonant Cluster Coda (/4) 2.90 1.411 2.52 1.476 2.919 .018
Digraph Onset (/4) 2.88 1.392 2.35 1.433 5.857* .035
Digraph Coda (/4) 2.55 1.532 2.22 1.342 2.175 .013
Note. * p < .05
Was there a main and interaction effect for language group, word position and consonantal
elements observed?
As Table 3 shows, a main effect of language was demonstrated whereby the alphabetic
group significantly outperformed the logographic group on spelling representation of allTHE EFFECT OF PHONEME POSITION ON L2 SPELLING 20
consonantal elements (i.e., singletons, consonant clusters, digraphs) (F (1, 162) = 4.537, p < .05,
η2=.027). There was also a main effect for word position whereby the participants represented
elements in the onset position more accurately compared to the same types of elements in the
coda position (F (1, 162) = 107.164, p < .01, η2=.398). In addition, there was a main effect for
consonantal element as the participants represented singletons more accurately followed by
consonant clusters and digraphs (F (1, 162) = 297.210, p < .01, η2=.822). In terms of
interactions, an interaction effect between consonantal element type and word position was
noted. Specifically, regardless of home language, students represented all three consonantal
elements more accurately in the onset position compared to coda position (F (1, 162) =
88.550, p < .01, η2=.353). The interaction of language, consonantal element and position was not
significant (F (1, 162) = 1.60, p > .05, η2=.000). The interaction between language group and
consonantal element was also not significant (F (1, 162) = .044, p > .05, η2=.000), neither was
the interaction of language group by word position (F (1, 162) = 007, p > .05, η2=.000).
Table 2. The Role of Language Group, Consonantal Element and Word Position in Pseudoword
Spelling: Repeated Measures ANOVA Summary Table
Source df F Partial η2
Language group 1 4.537* .027
Consonantal Element 1 297.210** .822
Word position 1 107.164** .398
Language group x Consonantal 1 .044 .000
Element .
Language Group x Word 1 .007 .000
position
Word Position x Consonantal 1 88.550** .353
Element
Language Group x Word 1 1.606 .010
Position x Consonantal Element
Notes. * p < .05; ** p < .01THE EFFECT OF PHONEME POSITION ON L2 SPELLING 21
Did spelling error types vary as a function of home language?
The logographic group made more errors compared to the alphabetic group. As seen in
Table 3, the logographic group were more likely to replace a singleton with another singleton
that is phonologically related more frequently than the alphabetic group in singleton onset (e.g.,
vist à fist, bist, thist; nesh à lesh) (F (1, 162) = 5.284, p < .05, η2=.034) and singleton coda
(e.g., spiv à spif, spib; thop à tob) (F (1, 162) =5.725, p < .05, η2=.034). The logographic
group were also more likely to represent the intended singleton with a string of letters that
included the intended singleton and/or letters that is related to the intended singleton in the coda
position (e.g., spiv à saifps, savxf) (F (1, 162) =9.661, p < .01, η2=.034=.056). Furthermore, the
logographic group reduced consonant clusters to a single intended consonant (i.e., consonant
cluster reduced to one of the intended letters of the cluster) more frequently than the alphabetic
group. This was noted in both onset (e.g., stiv à siv, tiv) (F (1, 162) = 8.762, p < .05, η2=.026)
and coda positions (e.g., visp à vis, vip) (F (1, 162) =4.505, p < .05, η2=.027). The logographic
group also made more errors where they replaced two letters that are related to the intended
consonant cluster in onset (e.g., stiv à sdv) (F (1, 162) =9.999, p < .01, η2=.058) and coda (e.g.,
visp à visb) positions (F (1, 162) =5.066, p < .05, η2=.030). The logographic group also reduced
more frequently digraphs to the first letter (e.g., sh à s; th à t). This error involving digraph
reduction to the first letter of digraph occurred significantly more frequently in the logographic
group than in the alphabetic group in the onset position (e.g., theg à teg; shen à sen) (F (1,
162) = 8.227, p < .01, η2=.048). As for digraphs in coda position, the logographic group made
significantly more errors compared to the alphabetic group in the following categories: doubling
of consonants using letters related to intended (e.g., geth à geff, gess) (F (1, 162) = 6.037, p <
.05, η2=.036) and substitution of a digraph with a single letter plus insertion of a vowel (e.g.,THE EFFECT OF PHONEME POSITION ON L2 SPELLING 22
poth à pofe, pove) F (1, 162) =15.566, p < .01, η2=.088. In sum, the logographic group made
errors on consonantal elements that are absent in their L1. The alphabetic group, on the other
hand, made more errors involving a vowel insertion along with the intended digraph (e.g.,
nesh à neshe) than the logographic group (F (1, 162) = 5.760, p < .05, η2=.034). Examples of
spelling errors made by the logographic and alphabetic groups are found in Appendix E.
Table 3. Spelling Errors as a Function of Element and Word Position in Pseudoword Spelling:
Descriptive Statistics and MANOVA by Language Group5
Alphabetic Logographic
N=83 N=81
Element Orthographic Phonological M SD M SD F (Language Partial
and Error Category Error Group) η2
Position Subcategory
Singleton Single Phoneme Intended .49 .802 .85 1.163 4.569* .034
Onset Representation singleton is
(Phoneme substituted with
Substitution) a phonologically
related phoneme
Singleton String of letters String of letters, .16 .455 .47 .792 9.661** .056
coda including
intended and/or
letters related to
intended
Single Phoneme Intended .48 .942 .90 1.281 5.725* .034
Representation singleton is
(Phoneme substituted with
Substitution) a phonologically
related phoneme
Consonant Single Phoneme Consonant .34 .801 .64 1.207 4.311* .026
Cluster Representation cluster is
onset (Consonant reduced to one
Cluster of the intended
Reduction) letters
Two Letter Representation .00 .000 .23 .676 9.999** .058
Representation of two letters
and both letters
are related to the
letters from the
intended
consonantal
elementTHE EFFECT OF PHONEME POSITION ON L2 SPELLING 23
Consonant Single Phoneme Consonant .14 .521 .37 .813 4.505* .027
Cluster Representation cluster is
coda (Consonant reduced to one
Cluster of the intended
Reduction) letters
Two Letter Representation .02 .154 .15 .477 5.066* .030
Representation of two letters
and both letters
are related to the
letters from the
intended
consonantal
element
Digraph Single Phoneme Digraph .24 .691 .62 .969 8.227** .048
onset Representation reduction:
(Digraph digraph got
Reduction) reduced to the
first letter (i.e.,
th à t; sh à s)
Digraph Consonant Consonant .00 .00 .12 .458 6.037* .036
Coda doubling doubling of
containing letter that is
incorrect letter phonologically
related to
intended
consonantal
element
Vowel insertion Singleton other .02 .154 .32 .327 15.556** .088
than intended
consonantal
element with a
vowel inserted
Intended
consonantal .17 .581 .01 .111 5.670* .034
element with
vowel inserted
Notes. * p < .05, ** p < .01
Comparison of the Alphabetic and Logographic Groups on Cognitive, Phonological,
Decoding, English Proficiency and Spelling Skills
Results of this section are presented in Table 4. The logographic group’s performance on
cognitive skills was superior compared to the alphabetic group overall. That is, the logographic
__________________________
5
Note, Table 5 only reports the descriptive statistics and MANOVA results for spelling errors that were significantly
different between the alphabetic and logographic groups. Please see Appendix D for the detailed spelling error
coding system.THE EFFECT OF PHONEME POSITION ON L2 SPELLING 24
group performed significantly better than the alphabetic group on nonverbal reasoning (F (1,
162) = 21.801, p < .01, η2=.119) and RAN seconds (F (1, 162) =8.756, p < .01, η2=.047=.051).
At the same time, the alphabetic group outperformed the logographic group on the following
phonological skills: word segmentation (F (1, 162) =28.500, p < .01, η2=.150) and nonword
segmentation (F (1, 162) = 22.240, p < .01, η2=.121). However, both the alphabetic and
logographic groups performed similarly on the auditory discrimination task (F (1, 162) = .000,
p > .05, η2=.000). While the logographic group outperformed the alphabetic group on word
reading (F (1, 162) =7.643, p < .01, η2=.045) the alphabetic and logographic group did not differ
significantly on pseudoword reading (F (1, 162) =.0.10, p > .05, η2=.000). When it came to
vocabulary knowledge, the logographic group outperformed the alphabetic group (F (1, 162)
=4.002, p < .05, η2=.024). In terms of spelling, the logographic group performed significantly
better than the alphabetic group on real word spelling (F (1, 162) = 8.020, p < .01, η2=.047),
however the alphabetic group outperformed the logographic group on pseudoword spelling (F (1,
162) = 4.437, p < .05, η2=.027).
Table 4. Comparison of Cognitive Processing, Phonological Processing, Decoding, English
Proficiency and Spelling Skills: Descriptive Statistics and MANOVA by Language Group
Alphabetic Logographic
N=83 N=83
Measure M SD M SD F (Language) Partial η2
Nonverbal Reasoning (/64) 22.33 8.844 29.93 11.823 21.801** .119
RAN seconds 49.988 17.103 43.02 12.644 8.756** .051
Word Segmentation (/20) 9.76 4.327 6.17 4.274 28.500** .150
Nonword Segmentation (/20) 9.23 4.642 5.94 4.282 22.240** .121
Auditory Discrimination (/34) 28.37 3.484 28.37 3.132 .000 .000
Word Reading (/106) 47.60 17.016 54.38 14.230 7.643** .045
Pseudoword Reading (/45) 20.41 10.402 20.58 11.884 .010 .000
Vocabulary Knowledge (/228) 95.51 18.451 101.57 20.327 4.002* .024
Real Word Spelling (/16) 10.49 4.338 12.37 4.143 8.020** .047
Pseudoword Spelling (/32) 23.73 7.657 21.26 7.214 4.537* .027
Notes. * p < .05; ** p < .01THE EFFECT OF PHONEME POSITION ON L2 SPELLING 25
Was there a main and interaction effect of language group and spelling task type on L2
spelling?
As can be seen in Table 5, there was no main effect of both language group (F=.142, p >
.05, η2=.001) and spelling task type (F=.005, p > .05, η2=.000). However, the interaction of
language group by spelling task type was significant (F (1, 162) = 4.437, p < .05, η2=.027).
Specifically, the alphabetic group spelled pseudowords more accurately compared to the real
word spelling while the accuracy rates of spelling real words in the logographic group was
significantly higher than their spellings of pseudowords.
Table 5: The Effect of Language Group and Spelling Task Type on L2 Spelling: Repeated
Measures ANOVA Summary Table
Source df F Partial η2
Language group 1 .142 .001
Spelling Task Type 1 .005 .000
Language Group x 1 31.205** .162
Spelling Task Type
Note. ** p < .01
Discussion
General Trends of L2 Spelling among the Alphabetic and Logographic Groups
The first hypothesis of this study focused on comparing the rates of accurate spelling
representations of singletons, consonant clusters and digraphs, regardless of word position. The
study showed that children in both alphabetic and logographic groups represent singletons most
accurately, followed by consonant clusters, and digraphs being most difficult for both groups. In
other words, regardless of home language, and in line with previous studies, young ELL children
are more likely to struggle with the representation of multi-letter elements, such as consonant
clusters and digraphs, compared to singletons.THE EFFECT OF PHONEME POSITION ON L2 SPELLING 26
The second hypothesis of the study focused on the positional effect of spelling on the
representation of three consonantal elements (i.e., singletons, consonant clusters and digraphs) as
previous ELL studies only focused on singletons. This study demonstrated that children in both
the alphabetic and logographic groups represented singletons, consonant clusters and digraphs
more accurately in the onset position than the same elements in the coda position. This finding
supports previous findings regarding the role of stress emphasis and serial position effect on the
saliency of elements in the onset position of words. In this regard, again, it appears that the
overall, the ELL participants in this show performed similarly to what has been noted before
with regard to EL1 children (e.g., Werfel & Schule, 2012; Levelt, Schiller & Levelt, 2000).
Considering Jointly L2 Spelling from the Perspective of L1 Typological Difference, Dual-
Route Model, and Home Literacy Practices
The third hypothesis aimed to investigate spelling elements in English where specific
linguistic elements of L1 might lead to differences that reflect typological differences between
the alphabetic and logographic groups. To understand whether the spelling errors made by the
alphabetic and logographic groups were uniquely associated with features of their L1, an error
analysis was carried out for singletons, consonant clusters and digraphs in both onset and coda
positions. The error analysis revealed that the logographic group made more spelling errors than
the alphabetic group in all consonantal element types in both onset and coda positions.
In both singleton onset and coda, the logographic group had difficulties with representing
/v/ accurately as this phoneme is absent in their L1. As a result, the logographic group made
errors such as presenting phonemes that are phonologically related to v (e.g., vist
à fist, bist, thist; spiv à spif, spib), as well as representing v as a string of letters that consisted
of v and/or an element related to v in the coda position (e.g., spiv à savxf). Furthermore, theYou can also read
