Abstract
The study of the strategies that children use in reading words and the analysis of errors that typically occur throughout the learning process are of critical importance for the understanding of reading acquisition. The objective of this study was to understand the process of reading acquisition in European Portuguese in the beginning of elementary school. We sought to know if there would be differences in the frequency of phonological and lexical errors and in the pattern of phonological errors between the first two years of elementary school. The participants were 175 children from the 1st year and 137 from the 2nd year from 6 schools. An oral word reading task was applied. The errors were categorized as phonological, with several subcategories, and lexical. Differences were found in the frequency of phonological and lexical errors between the two years as well as in the subtypes of phonological errors that typically occurred. The most frequent errors were in substitution, occurring mostly in the consonants and digraphs. Errors of addition and suppression mainly occurred in complex syllables. These results that contributed to a characterization of the typical errors in this learning phase are an important tool in the detection of early difficulties in the reading process and in the adequacy of teaching-learning strategies. This study allows for a better understanding of the processes used by children in solving the problems that the characteristics of the Portuguese language poses to them, as well as allowing for an educational intervention that leads to greater success in learning to read.
Beginning learners; Learning; Word reading; Error pattern