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Published (Version of record)CC BY V4.0, Open Access
Published (Version of record)CC BY V4.0, Open
Journal article
An Early Reading Assessment Battery for Multilingual Learners in Malaysia
Frontiers in Psychology, Vol.11, pp.1-16
10/07/2020
PMCID: PMC7365852
PMID: 32754104
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Abstract
The aim of the study was to develop a new comprehensive reading assessment battery for multi-ethnic and multilingual learners in Malaysia. Using this assessment battery, we examined the reliability, validity, and dimensionality of the factors associated with reading difficulties/disabilities in the Malay language, a highly transparent alphabetic orthography. In order to further evaluate the reading assessment battery, we compared results from the assessment battery with those obtained from the Malaysian national screening instrument. In the study, 866 Grade 1 children from multi-ethnic and multilingual backgrounds from 11 government primary schools participated. The reading assessment battery comprised 13 assessments, namely, reading comprehension, spelling, listening comprehension, letter name knowledge, letter name fluency, rapid automatized naming, word reading accuracy, word reading efficiency, oral reading fluency, expressive vocabulary, receptive vocabulary, elision, and phonological memory. High reliability and validity were found for the assessments. An exploratory factor analysis yielded three main constructs: phonological-decoding, sublexical-fluency, and vocabulary-memory. Phonological-decoding was found to be the most reliable construct that distinguished between at-risk and non-at-risk children. Identifying these underlying factors will be useful for detecting children at-risk for developing reading difficulties in the Malay language. In addition, these results highlight the importance of including a range of reading and reading-related measures for the early diagnosis of reading difficulties in this highly transparent orthography.
Details
- Title
- An Early Reading Assessment Battery for Multilingual Learners in Malaysia
- Creators
- Julia A. C Lee - Universiti Malaysia SarawakSeungjin Lee - Sehan UniversityNur Fatihah Mat Yusoff - Universiti Malaysia SarawakPuay Hoon Ong - Dyslexia Association of SarawakZaimuariffudin Shukri Nordin - Universiti Malaysia SarawakHeather Winskel - Southern Cross University
- Publication Details
- Frontiers in Psychology, Vol.11, pp.1-16
- Publisher
- Frontiers Research Foundation
- Grant note
- The research reported in this article was supported by the Ministry of Education Malaysia [Grant FRGS/SSI09(02)/983/2013 24]. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the Ministry of Education Malaysia. We thank Universiti Malaysia Sarawak for the financial support of this publication.
- Identifiers
- 991012926963102368
- Copyright
- © 2020 Lee, Lee, Yusoff, Ong, Nordin and Winskel. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
- Academic Unit
- School of Health and Human Sciences; Human Sciences; Faculty of Health
- Language
- English
- Resource Type
- Journal article