Teachers are increasingly using new technologies such as tablets and apps during shared reading experiences at preschool. However, little is known about how teachers scaffold young children's shared reading with interactive e-books such as tablet-based storybook apps and how it compares to using printed books. In this observational study, a…

Parents play a key role in supporting young children's interactions with tablets (e.g. iPads). Little is known about the types of scaffolding parents provide during tablet activities and how these relate to child age, SES, and home use. Fifty-five parent-child dyads (M child age = 3.49 years) were videoed as they played on an iPad. All parent…

Mothers play a key role in scaffolding children's writing using traditional tools, such as paper and pencil. However, little is known about how mothers scaffold young children's writing using touch-screen tablets (e.g., iPads) and the associations between maternal scaffolding and emergent literacy. Mother-child dyads (N = 47; M child…

The use of touch screen tablets by young children is increasing in the home and in early childhood settings. The simple tactile interface and finger-based operating features of tablets may facilitate preschoolers' use of tablet application software and support their educational development in domains such as literacy. This article reviews…

Mother-child dyads (N = 35) were videoed as they wrote a shopping list in an environmental print-rich grocery shop play setting. The children (M age = 4.3 years) were assessed on emergent literacy skills (letter name and sound knowledge, print concepts, phonological awareness, and letter and name writing). Mothers' general level of print and…

Young children are surrounded by environmental print on a daily basis. Through their visual exploration of environmental print, coupled with sociocultural experiences, children gain valuable semantic and symbolic knowledge as they make sense of their world. The aim of this review is to examine the question of whether environmental print has value…

Joint writing activities between parent and child can enhance literacy skills in young children. This paper describes the strategies used by a mother to scaffold her daughter's alphabet letter shaping, word and story writing in the years before formal schooling. The strategies included identifying alphabet letters embedded in environmental print…

The ways in which parent-child interactions can encourage the development of emergent literacy skills in young children remains to be fully explored. The present report describes how one parent scaffolded her young child's emergent writing and letter knowledge in the home. Environmental print provided many rich and meaningful examples for the…