Children's ability to recognize letters and their corresponding sounds is of primary importance in early reading achievement (Ehri, Nunes, Willows, Schuster, Yaghoub-Zadeh & Shanahan, 2001). One useful strategy used in teaching pre-readers letter-sound relations is mnemonics (Ehri,1984). Mnemonics are effective because they connect seemingly unconnected bits of information in memory (Levin, 1993). Research has shown the value of mnemonics for first language learning and second language letter learning and vocabulary acquisition. This study explores what makes mnemonics most effective in letter learning. And once children learn the letters, do mnemonics exert a mediating influence to help them retain and apply their letter knowledge in reading and spelling words?

This study explored the use of two types of pictorial mnemonics to teach non-Hebrew speaking children Hebrew letter sound relations. Using a pretest-training-posttest repeated measures design, each child served as his or her own control. Students were given pretests to assess their English and Hebrew letter knowledge and overall cognitive ability. They then received training to segment initial sounds in words. Each child then learned five Hebrew letters with integrated mnemonics and five Hebrew letters with disassociated mnemonics. Integrated mnemonics were presented on cards with the bare letter and, beneath it, the letter embedded in the mnemonic picture whose name began with the sound of the letter and whose shape resembled the shape of the letter (e.g., snake drawn as S). Disassociated mnemonics were also presented on cards with the bare letter accompanied by a picture or photograph beneath it. Although all the pictures depicted the same objects as the integrated pictures, they were drawn differently from the shapes of the letters. A week later, students were given posttests to assess memory for the letter-sound correspondences learned. Transfer posttests assessed the ability to apply learned letter knowledge in reading and spelling tasks.

Findings indicated that letter-sound relations learned using integrated pictorial mnemonics were learned more effectively, remembered more efficiently, and used in transfer reading and spelling tasks more successfully. Integrated mnemonics helped learners connect letter sounds with their arbitrary letter shapes by providing a non-arbitrary visual link.