Abstract
This study investigated the development of auditory-phonological and visualorthographic word recognition and the relationship between both performance types in 155 Japanese elementary school students learning English as a foreign language (EFL).
Although reading activities are included in the new Course of Study (MEXT, 2018a), the extent to which young Japanese learners can read English words is unclear. Auditoryphonological and visual-orthographic word recognition by fifth- and sixth-grade students was assessed using 40 multiple-choice test items. The results showed that, first, sixthgrade students statistically surpassed fifth-grade students in both auditory-phonological and visual-orthographic recognition; second, auditory-phonological recognition was stronger than visual-orthographic recognition in both grades; third, sixth-grade students’ visual-orthographic recognition was more strongly correlated with their auditoryphonological recognition than the correlation among fifth-grade students; and finally, regression analysis found that auditory-phonological word recognition was the strongest predictor of visual-orthographic word recognition in both reading proficiency groups. The similarity of Roman character reading was second strongest, and was more significant in the low reading proficiency group. This implies that students with higher reading proficiency utilize other strategies, and that seems to be a process of reading English words among young Japanese EFL students.
