A large extant research base documents the positive effects shared book reading (SBR) can have on children's language development, reading comprehension, and other reading-related outcomes. Most studies examined the effects of researcher directed SBR, with an assortment of components that go beyond simply reading the text. It is possible, however,…

Early literacy skills such as print knowledge are essential building blocks for children's later reading and academic outcomes. Shared book reading activities in early childhood classrooms offer rich opportunities through which educators can support children's print knowledge development by explicitly referring to a book's print. Such references…

This study explores book talks as an approach to teaching Nature of Science (NOS) to young children (4-6 years old). To teach about NOS means to, in one way or another, focus on the processes, humans that build science knowledge, as well as the characteristics and limits of scientific knowledge. Previous research in this area has studied the…

Multiple racial issues in America have been brought to the forefront by the recent deaths of African Americans, yet many teachers feel unprepared to engage with students around issues of race. Their discomfort is likely because traditional textbooks omitted the experiences of non-dominant, marginalized groups, thereby denying readers an…

Home literacy experiences and observed parent and child behaviors during shared book reading were investigated in preschool-age children with hearing loss and with typical hearing to examine the relationships between those factors and children's language skills. The methods involved parent-reported home literacy experiences and videotaped…

An experimental study was conducted to examine the effects of shared book reading and video viewing on preschoolers' vocabulary and knowledge acquisition in informational text. The study included 60 preschool children who were randomly assigned to three experimental groups --shared book reading group, video viewing group, and shared book reading…

Purpose: Opportunities to actively engage in literacy instruction should be accessible to all students in the classroom. Shared book reading provides a literacy-based context in which teachers may adapt their communication to allow students with a range of abilities to participate. The current study examines teacher communication during shared…

Given the emerging evidence on the importance of learning content-specific vocabulary in the early years, many early childhood teachers try to incorporate science vocabulary teaching as part of classroom activities. In this article, the authors argue for the importance of teaching science vocabulary in engaging ways using read-aloud and the…

Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, young children did not attend school in the traditional setting. However, many teachers, schools, and districts conducted online instruction to allow students to still learn despite the restrictions. After two years, teachers and students returned to the classrooms and schools. However, the time away from school…

In response to rising parental incarceration, some correctional facilities and outside organizations offer family literacy programs for parents in prison. However, research on these correctional education initiatives is scant. This paper uses qualitative data to analyze how 11 fathers in a rural Pennsylvania prison were involved in their…

There is a need for empirically based educational practices shown to support learning, yet validation tends to require a high degree of experimental control that can limit ecological validity and translation to classrooms. We describe our iterative intervention design to support preschoolers' vocabulary through book reading coupled with playful…

This study investigates the use of specific educative features for supporting the teaching of nature of science (NOS) during read-alouds of elementary science trade books. Educative features are components of educative curriculum materials that aim to increase teachers' content knowledge and support effective instructional practices. Understanding…

Deaf and hard-of-hearing (DHH) literature, including the reading behaviour of Deaf adults, suggests that Teachers of the deaf (TODs) read different amounts of text during read alouds to DHH prereaders based on the spoken and visual communication modes DHH prereaders use, such as: American Sign Language (ASL), only spoken English (speech),…

While guest teaching in a third-grade classroom as part of her doctoral studies, the author became interested in how students think about female pioneers and what it means to be first in a historical sense. This article explores the potential of interactive read-aloud books to teach women's history with young students.

Preparing teachers to teach nature of science (NOS) is difficult, although it is a central goal of science education. Educative curriculum materials, which address teachers' understandings of NOS and pedagogical decisions for teaching, may be one way in which NOS teaching can be improved. However, to effectively design these materials, it is…