A STUDY FOR DEVELOPING THE TEST OF EARLY LITERACY FOR TURKISH KINDERGARTEN CHILDREN

Abstract

This presentation is aimed to put an emphasis of early literacy skills of preschoolers especially children at risk. With this aim in this presentation, the results of research of developing early literacy test will be introduced to the audience. This research was planned due to the crucial need for a standardized measure of early literacy with demonstrated validity and reliability for Turkish children. Therefore, this study aimed to develop a standardized measure of early literacy - the Test of Early Literacy (TEL) for kindergarten children and to test its validity and reliability. Participants were 403 kindergarten children selected from several schools located in neighborhoods of different socioeconomic statuses in Ankara. The early literacy skills of children were tested with 7 sub-tests of TEL (Receptive Language, Expressive Language, Category Naming, Function Knowledge, Letter Knowledge, Phonological Awareness, and Listening Comprehension). The gathered data was used to analyze the validity and reliability of TEL. In general, the findings suggest that TEL has adequate validity and reliability for evaluating the early literacy skills of Turkish kindergarten children.