| Summary: | The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between phonological awareness at 5 years of age and later academic achievement throughout compulsory school in Iceland. During 1997–1998, 267 Icelandic preschool children, all aged from 5;4 to 5;10 were tested with the HLJÓM-2, an Icelandic phonological awareness screening test designed specifically for preschool teachers to identify children at risk of developing reading difficulties. Research has shown that children with strong phonological awareness at the beginning of first grade usually learn to read more easily than children who fall behind their peers in phonological awareness. Although it has been demonstrated that phonological awareness can be improved with intervention, the early identification of children at risk needs to be based on a valid tool sensitive enough to correctly identify children at risk. In 2011, children from the sample previously tested with the HLJÓM-2, now aged 18–19 years, were again contacted. Out of the original 267 participants, 221 (83%) consented to have their results from the preschool language assessment compared with their performance on national tests in Grades 4, 7, and 10. They also answered an online questionnaire addressing various aspects of their lives, including experiences in compulsory school; whether they had received or needed special support there due to learning difficulties, and whether they had been diagnosed with conditions that interfered with learning, including learning disabilities and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). An analysis was conducted to investigate what proportion of students had improved their position, or fallen further behind compared to peers, after completing the HLJÓM-2 and until taking the national tests in Icelandic in Grades 4, 7 and 10. The analysis also focused on whether special educational support in compulsory school, or diagnosis with a learning disability or ADHD, had increased the students’ likelihood of scoring higher on national tests in Icelandic ...
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