Az iskolába lépő gyermekek fonológiai tudatosságának vizsgálata homogén és heterogén életkorú óvodai csoportokban

Abstract

Phonological awareness is a key prerequisite for the acquisition of reading and writing skills, and its development in early childhood significantly influences later academic achievement. The aim of this study was to examine the level of phonological awareness among children of compulsory school age entering primary school, with special attention to potential differences between those attending homogeneous and heterogeneous age-group kindergarten classes. The research was conducted on a non-representative sample of 30 children from two urban kindergartens. We used the Phonological Awareness Test developed by Ágnes Jordanidisz, which—although not standardized—provides age-related reference values and allows for the detailed assessment of syllable- and phoneme-level skills. The results indicate that most children performed at or above the expected reference values in syllable-based tasks, particularly in syllable segmentation, synthesis, and deletion. In contrast, phoneme-level tasks revealed greater individual differences. The study did not identify substantial differences between the performances of children in homogeneous and heterogeneous age-group classes; however, age-related variation and differing developmental levels require differentiated pedagogical support. These findings reinforce the importance of targeted, play-based development of phonological awareness in preschool education, which may contribute to the prevention of later reading and writing difficulties.