Developing Reading Readiness Test for Preschool Children: Study of the Preliminary Version's Psychometric Properties

One of the components of school readiness is reading readiness. Development of valid and reliable tools to assess the pre-reading skills in preschool children by taking into consideration the Persian language and culture is one of the educational needs and part of the process of decision making and placement. The purpose of this study was to provide an effective tool for assessing reading readiness of preschool children and investigating the psychometric properties of its preliminary version.

This study was a correlational research with descriptive-analytical design. The study population included all the preschool children in Tehran in 2019.The sample consisted of 64 children selected by convenience sampling. In the first stage, the test was conducted on 33 children at the end of the preschool and in the second stage it was administrated to 31 children at the beginning of the preschool period. This test consists of six subtests of vocabulary, visual distinction, auditory differentiation, print knowledge, letters knowledge, and rapid naming. In this study, test-retest (with two-week interval) and Cronbach's alpha coefficient were used to evaluate the reliability of the test. Also, content validity, criterion validity, and construct validity were used to evaluate the test validity.

Concurrent validity showed a significant positive correlation between Reading Readiness Test, Test of Language Development, and Test of Phonological Awareness. Considering the significance of t-test for the comparison of the two groups of children at the beginning and end of the preschool period, as well as children with and without preschool experience, the discriminated validity of the test was confirmed. Reliability of the test is confirmed based on test-retest ranging from 0.39 to 0.87 and Cronbach's alpha coefficients ranging from 0.15 to 0.85.

In sum, the Reading Readiness Test is a reliable and valid instrument that can be used as a tool for assessing pre-reading skills of preschool children.