Forty-nine African American children (ages 3-5) enrolled in Head Start were assessed using the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test. Their mean score was significantly lower than the mean for the normative sample. Few items were systematically missed; instead, performance seemed reflective of socioeconomic and/or ethnic patterns of vocabulary usage.…

A study investigated the first words produced by 17 bilingual children (ages 1-4) speaking English and Mandarin Chinese from environments where both languages were spoken. A greater number of nouns than verbs were produced as first words in both English and Mandarin Chinese. Verbs were produced only in Mandarin Chinese. (Contains references.)…

A study examined the relationship between phonemic awareness and reading ability in 29 elementary children enrolled in a residential school for students with deafness. Reading ability was significantly correlated to language ability, but not to phonemic awareness. Phonemic awareness did not contribute to any variance in reading ability. (Contains…

Language development was studied in 310 pairs of 4-year-old twins. Rotated factor analyses indicated presence of a general language factor (L) and a general nonverbal factor (NV). Moderate genetic influence was found for L and NV abilities. Bivariate genetic analysis estimated a genetic correlation of .63 between L and NV abilities. Results…

Hearing stories read aloud enhances children's language skills, makes accessible texts that are beyond children's decoding skills or that use old-fashioned words, foreign names, expressions, dialects, or nonstandard grammatical constructions. This article provides models for the differentiated voices of characters, helps young listeners appreciate…

Recent research has established closer links between language, cognition, and social life than Piaget or Vygotsky imagined. Connections have been established between object permanence development and acquisition of disappearance words and the quantity and quality of child-adult joint attentional social interactions and children's early word…

A study tested models concerning syntactic categories in early multiword speech by investigating overlap in contexts in which children (n=11) used determiner types. Results indicate children have little knowledge of relationships between different determiner types, suggesting development of an adultlike syntactic determiner category may be…

Studies of the written language of students who are deaf or hard-of-hearing addressed, among other topics, level of reading skills, development of language skills after age 12, and evidence of a critical age for language learning. Data collection methods, research outcomes, and an overview of other articles in the theme issue are discussed. (CR)

The compositions of 49 students (ages 10-14) with deafness or hearing impairments and 49 typical students were compared to investigate the frequency and proportional distribution of written-language variables. Differences were found between the strategies chosen by the students with deafness or hearing impairments in both syntax and semantics and…

The relationship between play scores and communication skills, measured in two ways, was investigated in 19 young children with Down syndrome. Results found the relationship between observations of children's play skills and their language competence was strongest when play scores were compared to mothers' reports of communicative competence.…

A study assessed whether two children (ages 4-6) with autism could be taught a child-initiated query as a pivotal response to facilitate the use of grammatical morphemes. Children learned the strategy and acquired and generalized the targeted morpheme. Children also showed increases in mean length of utterance and verb acquisition. (Contains…

Maintains that Tabors' edited work is the most comprehensive and practical book on the topic available and an essential part of the knowledge base for early care and education professionals. Highlights the book's practical suggestions, concrete examples to illustrate language principles, and recommendations for teachers. Asserts that the content…

Lexical diversity of 53 children with specific language impairment (SLI) (ages 3-7) was compared to 91 typical peers and younger children matched for mean length of utterance in words (MLUw). Older subgroups showed higher lexical diversity. At lower MLUw levels, children with SLI showed higher diversity than the younger children. (Contains…

A study examined how 44 bilingual (Spanish-English) children (ages 4-7) used taxonomic versus slot-filler strategies in a category-generation task presented in both languages. Younger bilingual children generated approximately equal numbers of items in both conditions, however, older bilingual children were beginning to demonstrate a taxonomic…

This study compared the receptive language of adolescents and young adults with either Down syndrome (n=25), fragile X syndrome (n=19), or mental age matched typically developing children (n=24). Individuals with the syndromes differed in relative achievements across the domains of receptive vocabulary, receptive syntax, nonverbal cognition, and…