Cross-lag analysis of longitudinal associations between primary school students’ writing and reading skills Giuliana Pinto 1 • Lucia Bigozzi 1 • Christian Tarchi 1 • Beatrice Accorti Gamannossi 1 • Laura Canneti 1 Published online: 30 May 2015 Ó Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2015 Abstract The present study examined the relationship between reading (i.e., ra- pidity and accuracy) and writing competences (i.e., fluency, accuracy, and com- position skills) of Italian children in the first and second grade. The performance of seventy-five children was longitudinally assessed over a 2-year period. Results demonstrated that reading and spelling were stable across the first two grades of primary school. Cross-lagged analyses suggested that spelling plays a pivotal role in the acquisition of formal literacy, especially within a transparent writing system like that of our Italian participants. Early progress in spelling becomes a resource for later reading acquisition. However, spelling did not correlate with the composition component of writing, suggesting the independence of these two processes. Results have implications for early childhood educators on the design and delivery of writing and reading instruction. Keywords Reading Á Writing Á Primary school Á Cross-lagged design panel This study will contribute to the debate on the nature of the interrelationships between reading and writing by exploring these two processes developmentally in a & Christian Tarchi christian.tarchi@gmail.com Giuliana Pinto pinto@unifi.it Lucia Bigozzi lbigozzi@unifi.it Beatrice Accorti Gamannossi tricebea@tiscali.it 1 Department of Education and Psychology, University of Florence (IT), via di San Salvi, 12, 50014 Florence, Italy 123 Read Writ (2015) 28:1233–1255 DOI 10.1007/s11145-015-9569-9