To ascertain whether paradigmatic performance on a word association test administered at the end of kindergarten is an effective predictor of reading achievement, 37 children were tested on the Syntagmatic-Paradigmatic Assessment (SPA) at the end of their kindergarten year. At the end of their first grade year, the children were administered a standardized reading test as a group and individually were given two oral reading tests. Correlations among the test findings were then computed. The results suggested that paradigmatic ability at the beginning stages of reading instruction does not influence first grade reading success. (FL)