The aim of this study of French kindergarten children was to compare emergent literacy performances of children at risk (schooled in REP, priority education network, and coming from low socioeconomic status families) to those of children in regular classes (coming from average socioeconomic status families). Results show that children schooled in REP have poorer performances than children in regular classes in the following areas : rhymes, vocabulary, letter knowledge and decoding. Their weak performances in emergent literacy skills would have an impact in delaying decoding acquisition.