Improving phonological awareness with Talking Tables in at-risk kindergarten readers.

Background: For young children experiencing phonological awareness (PA) difficulties, the need for early and targeted intervention to prevent reading disability is unequivocal. There are very few studies, however, on the efficacy of PA interventions delivered at school.

Aims: This study examined the impact of an early PA intervention embedded within an oral language program designed for at-risk kindergartners.

Methods: Using a quasi-experimental pretest/posttest design, at-risk readers from four schools received either the 10-week intervention in small groups, three times a week for 30 min as a supplement to the regular classroom curriculum or served as controls not participating in the intervention and receiving the usual classroom instruction.

Results: Children in the intervention group demonstrated a greater use of phonological awareness at posttest on overall composites of phonological processing, and on several individual accuracy and fluency measures targeting skills at the phoneme level.

Conclusions: The results add to accumulating evidence on the efficacy and effectiveness of teacher-delivered school-based early literacy interventions.