The role of vocabulary components in second language learners' early reading comprehension

Background In countries with German as an official language, children a second language perform overall worse in school than their native speaking peers. This particularly affects written skills, which require advanced knowledge. The reasons are manifold, but one is prominent, namely poor vocabulary Vocabulary, however, consists not only of the number known words also complex and hitherto under-researched lexico-semantic framework, referred to depth. Method present study, sample 373 (322 speakers 51 language) was examined longitudinally Grade 2 3 for reading comprehension breadth Vocabulary depth defined relational semantic word Latent change score models on development including precursor non-verbal intelligence SES were conducted. Results scored lower tests, difference being more pronounced breadth. Importantly, differences did tend diminish over time, could have been expected. can be accounted mainly by variations vocabulary, especially Conclusions These findings emphasise importance context research who do speak majority language.