Unpacking the “Black Box” of Orthographic Learning: Identifying the Foundational Skills Underlying Efficient Reading for English- and Greek-speaking Children

Reading is the single most transferable skill taught in the elementary school years; it is the foundation for academic learning, economic contribution, and societal participation. Decades of research shows that efficient reading relies on precise mental spelling representations of individual words.

These orthographic representations enable children to recognize words by sight, releasing cognitive resources for understanding what they read.

Orthographic Learning (OL) is widely considered the mechanism through which readers build orthographic representations and develop efficient reading.

And yet its foundational skills have not been established, a gap in knowledge that severely limits our ability to teach children the skills they need to achieve efficient reading.

LEXIS will identify the foundational skills of OL and, in turn, efficient reading, so that we can develop effective instruction. LEXIS is a large-scale cross-language longitudinal study, following children from preschool through grade 2.

Through LEXIS, I will establish the foundational skills of OL for both typical and dyslexic readers; results for typical readers can be applied to whole classrooms and results for children with dyslexia will be the basis for effective teaching for children with the most intractable reading difficulties.

I will conduct this study with two distinctive languages: English and Greek; their similarities and differences will ensure that results can be applied across the diversity of European languages.

LEXIS takes an interdisciplinary approach, bringing together educational psychology, special education, and psycholinguistics. Data will be analysed with cutting-edge statistical and computational modeling approaches. Through LEXIS, I will identify which foundational skills most strongly predict OL and word reading development.

These identified skills will guide the foci of effective instruction, ensuring that all children achieve the strongest possible reading outcomes.