Microsoft Word Pub Series 004 # Kamil doc

 

 

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The Role of Oral Proficiency and L1 Literacy in L2 Reading 

The relationship between oral language and literacy is less straightforward for bilinguals 

than for monolinguals. It has been hypothesized that the relationship between children’s L1 and 

their readiness to begin L2 reading instruction centers on a common underlying proficiency. 

Cummins (1979) suggested that basic interpersonal communication skills (BICS) alone were not 

sufficient for children to acquire cognitive academic language proficiency (CALP) in their L2. 

Instead, children needed to achieve a threshold level of cognitive language proficiency, usually in 

their L1, before they can benefit from L2 instruction (Cummins, 1979). Although this need is 

often cited as a reason to support bilingual education, Cummins’ threshold and interdependence 

hypotheses are problematic as pointed out by a number of researchers (e.g., Bernhardt & Kamil 

1995; Edelsky, Hudelson, Flores, Barkin, Altwerger, & Jilbert, 1983; Genesee, 1984; Troike, 

1984). Furthermore, they are conceived so broadly that they cannot be tested empirically. 

Although there is some interdependence between a bilingual’s L1 and L2, the nature of that 

interdependence has not been clearly established.  

Recent research has shown that children can be taught to read in their L2 even as they are 

developing L2 oral language proficiency (Geva, 1995). Moreover, a measure of oral proficiency 

alone is often not enough to indicate children’s readiness to learn to read. For instance, 

Durgunoglu et al. (1993) found in their study of beginning readers that Spanish oral proficiency 

had no relationship to Spanish word recognition, and English oral proficiency did not correlate 

with the number of common English words read. August and Hakuta’s (1997) review of the 

literature also concludes that there is insufficient evidence to prove that ESL oral proficiency is a 

good predictor of reading ability. While positive correlations have been established for children at 

higher grade levels, the same cannot be said of children at lower grade levels nor across different 

first-language groups. One reason could be that traditional oral proficiency measures do not 

accurately measure a child’s receptive linguistic knowledge.  

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A related question is the role of L1 literacy in L2 reading development. Undoubtedly, 

being literate in L1 is helpful in learning to read in L2 because reading-related knowledge and a 

number of reading-related skills can be transferred across languages, such as phonological 

awareness, concepts of print, orthographic knowledge, and background knowledge. However, 

what is not clear, particularly for young children, is the question of how much L1 literacy is 

needed in order for transfer to occur. Much of the evidence supporting L1 literacy development 

comes from correlational studies that relate variables such as age of arrival or length of residence 

to L2 reading achievement (e.g., Cummins, 1981). Typically, these studies do not control for 

factors such as socioeconomic status, maturity, and motivation. Evaluation studies on bilingual 

education also suggest that L1 literacy benefits L2 reading development. For instance, Ramirez, 

Yuen, and Ramey (1991) reported that the students in their longitudinal study who had the most 

opportunity to develop their Spanish between kindergarten and sixth grade increased their 

standardized English reading test scores at a greater rate than students who received much less 

Spanish instruction.  

Although studies have shown that L1 and L2 literacy are highly correlated, they cannot 

determine that L1 literacy per se, or specific components of L1 literacy skills, leads to better L2 

reading. Research on adult learners using regression techniques shows the contribution of L1 

literacy to be between 14% and 21%, while the influence of L2 ability (grammatical knowledge) 

is estimated to be about 30% (Bernhardt & Kamil, 1995). There is little or no data on young 

bilinguals. The implication for instruction is that, for older students with developed L1 literacy 

skills, we can expect transfer of skills and knowledge of up to 20% (Bernhardt & Kamil, 1995). 

For younger children, there is the potential for transfer as well, especially in the areas of 

phonological knowledge and metalinguistic ability. However, this potential does not mean that 

instruction for younger children should only focus on isolated skills. Instruction that consists of 

both meaning-based instruction (whole language) and explicit skills teaching has been found to 

be successful with bilingual students (e.g., Perez, 1994). Au (2000) also cautions against the 

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overemphasis on low-level skills at the expense of higher order thinking and meaning making, 

particularly in the early grades, in which systematic instruction in word identification is necessary 

but not sufficient to develop fluent readers. 

 

L2 English Reading Instruction: An Overview 

We have made some suggestions for instruction in the preceding discussion. However, it 

is important to point out that the research base is very diverse and somewhat uneven, with 

typically a few studies addressing only some aspects of L2 reading. In the area of early L2 

reading development, we have quite a lot of information pertaining to phonological awareness but 

relatively little on early vocabulary development and still less on comprehension. The field of L2 

reading is interdisciplinary in nature and is informed by research in second-language acquisition, 

L1 reading research, cognitive studies on bilingual memory and processing, sociocultural studies 

on literacy, and evaluation studies on bilingual education. The complexity of reading in general, 

and of L2 reading in particular is great. What follows is our attempt to characterize the types of 

English reading instruction for L2 learners in U.S. classrooms. There are four prevailing models 

or approaches that represent a set of underlying principles and philosophy regarding the L1–L2 

relationship in literacy development, and each may advocate a variety of strategies.  

 

Model 1: Develop L2 oral proficiency before introducing L2 literacy  

This model, also known as the L2 threshold model, is by far the most common approach 

to teaching L2 learners. The main emphasis in this model is the development of oral proficiency 

and listening skills in L2. A typical view found in many reading methods texts is that “students 

should learn to listen, understand, and speak English in a natural way before they learn to read 

and write it” (Lapp & Flood, 1986, p. 320). This approach is largely derived from the standard 

approach to teaching reading in one’s first language, whereby oral reading is emphasized so that 

what is decoded orally can be mapped on to a child’s oral language. The logical extension of this 

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