Inhibitory control and literacy development among 3- to 5-year-old children

Abstract

In the article, two competences crucial for the development of school readiness have been analyzed: literacy and inhibitory control. The author, availing himself of the premises of Lev S. Vygotsky's theory, views the process of acquiring reading and writing skills as the development of a higher mental function – written speech. Early stages of the development of this function coincide also with the period of forming the so-called readiness to acquire reading and writing skills. It enables treating both the period before and after the beginning of formal training in literacy skills as the time during which the same developmental process operates. In addition, the author analyzes the importance of inhibitory control changes for consecutive stages of written speech development in preschoolers. This one of the most pivotal components of executive functions can be investigated already in two and a half year old children, enabling early identification of groups at risk of school difficulties. Assumptions concerning relationships between inhibitory control and literacy in the process of development were verified in a study of 336 children at the age of 3-5, with the use of Children Card Sort and Literacy Assessment Battery.