The phonological information provided by written words may be used by the reader as a convenient temporary storage medium and as a way of gaining access to the lexicon. Beginning readers should be able to exploit the sound-based patterning of the orthography in reading single words and to bypass it on occasion. Some words do not conform to English spelling-to-sound rules and must be read by sight. This also allows for fluent reading since the reader need not stop to sound out each word. However, this strategy places an enormous burden on the child's ability to memorize word shapes. Access to the lexicon by the phonological form of a word exploits the rules governing the relationship between orthography and sound. However, for a beginning reader, application of sound-spelling rules is time consuming, and beginning readers may not have sufficient awareness of the structure of words. Some research in phonological processing by beginning readers indicates that the use they make of phonological representation differs between good and poor readers. Also, a relationship between linguistic awareness and the ability to read isolated words has been shown. Third, reading skill and experience are related to skill in accessing the phonological form of a word. (TJ)