Phonological awareness has been repeatedlyreported as important for learning to read in differentorthographies. It is important to understand what specificlevels of phonological awareness are involved in Chineseand English for Chinese children who learn English-as-a-second-language (ESL). Measures of phonological aware-ness, word reading, letter name knowledge, receptivevocabulary, and non-verbal intelligence were administeredto 94 Hong Kong Chinese ESL kindergarteners. In terms ofwithin-language associations, phoneme awareness but notsyllable and rhyme awareness explained unique additionalvariance in English word reading. Tone awareness but notrhyme awareness uniquely explained Chinese word read-ing. Regarding cross-language associations, L2 syllableawareness but not L2 phoneme and rhyme awareness hadsignificant unique contribution to Chinese reading and L1tone awareness had significant unique contribution toEnglish reading. Phonological awareness at different grainsizes is involved in Chinese and English reading amongyoung ESL children. The current findings support thepsycholinguistic grain size theory that language-specificphonological awareness skills are involved in readingacquisition of different orthographies. The demonstratedbi-directional cross-language transfers of phonologicalawareness at specific linguistic levels partially support theidea that general phonological sensitivity is necessary forbeginning reading acquisition.

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• The Role of Phonological Awareness in Biliteracy AcquisitionAmong Hong Kong Chinese Kindergarteners Who Learn English-as-a-Second Language (ESL)