Learning to Read Words

In this chapter, the authors review what is known about how children learn to read words, surveying well-established findings and exploring new directions in this rapidly evolving field. They begin by considering what skills and knowledge children need to acquire if they are to become expert word readers: What, precisely, is the learning challenge? The knowledge about printed words, or orthographic knowledge, that children need to acquire to become skilled at word reading can be divided into two broad categories: sublexical knowledge about the orthographic subunits that make up words, and lexical knowledge about the precise orthographic form of individual words. Distinguishing between the sublexical and lexical domains, the authors examine key processes in word reading development from children's initial learning about letters and letter-sound mappings through to their acquisition of an expert system that recognizes words rapidly via access to rich, high-quality lexical representations.