The Impact of Environmental Print Instruction on Early Reading Ability.

READING; LOGOS (Symbols); KINDERGARTEN; EARLY childhood education; INSTRUCTIONAL systems

The purpose of this research was to ascertain if there were any significant differences in the ability to read logos and to make the transition to reading logos in manuscript forms of kindergarten children who received direct instruction with environmental print, those who received indirect instruction, and those who received no instruction with environmental print. The Environmental Print Checklist (EPC) was employed to measure the children's ability to read logos and to make the transition from reading actual logos to reading logos in manuscript forms. A quasi-experimental pre-post-test design was used with a convenience sample of six intact kindergarten classes from a large inner-city school system. The population consisted of 106 children at post-test. Those in the two treatment groups received 8 months of instruction using environmental print. After statistical analysis of the data it was found that the control and direct instruction groups were not significantly different from each other. However, the indirect instruction group scored significantly higher (p = .01) than both the direct instruction and the control groups at levels three, four, five, and six. The results of this study demonstrated that indirect instruction with environmental print improved kindergarten children's ability to read logos and aided them in making the transition from reading logos to reading logos in manuscript form. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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