The Roles of Linguistic Comprehension Skills, Decoding Skills and Metalinguistic-Cognitive Skills in Chinese-Speaking Children's English Reading Comprehension

This study comprehensively examines the roles of linguistic comprehension skills, decoding skills and metalinguistic-cognitive skills in English reading comprehension among 103 Chinese fifth and sixth graders.Specifically, the linguistic comprehension and decoding skills involved comprise English listening comprehension and oral vocabulary, as well as word reading, respectively, and the metalinguistic-cognitive skills involved include English phonological awareness, morphological awareness, orthographic awareness, and rapid naming.Results from multiple regressions and path analysis show that linguistic comprehension skills, decoding skills and metalinguistic-cognitive skills account for a large proportion of variance in English reading comprehension of Chinese children, with metalinguistic-cognitive skills affecting English reading comprehension either directly or indirectly via the mediation of linguistic comprehension skills and decoding skills, and morphological awareness and oral vocabulary being two core component skills as final predictors of Chinese children's English reading.The findings suggest that reading English as a second language in Chinese children has universal properties of reading as well as its own specificity, providing significant implications for English reading teaching, reading acquisition and reading assessment at the stage of China's basic education.