Following a Herculean effort by staff members at the author's school, students were reading more than ever and the reading culture was well on the way to changing for the better. While the author was excited beyond belief by this development, she was frustrated by the fact that students consistently reverted to summarizing when they were asked to…

One of the thorniest aspects of teaching languages is developing students' vocabulary, yet it is impossible to be "an accurate and highly communicative language user with a very small vocabulary" (Milton, 2009, p. 3). Nation (2006) indicates that more vocabulary than previously thought is required to function well both at spoken and…

The present investigation explored the question of whether walking onset is related to infant language development. Study 1 used a longitudinal design (N = 44) to assess infant locomotor and language development every 2 weeks from 10 to 13.5 months of age. The acquisition of walking was associated with a significant increase in both receptive and…

The purpose of this study was to examine how oral vocabulary instruction was enacted in kindergarten. Four days (12 hours) of instruction were observed in 55 classrooms in a range of socio-economic status schools. All instruction was coded for evidence of vocabulary instruction for a total of 660 hours of observation. Results revealed that…

The study investigated the role of word-level and verbal skills in writing quality of learners who spoke English as a first (L1) and second (L2) language. One hundred and sixty-eight L1 and L2 learners (M = 115.38 months, SD = 3.57 months) participated in the study. All testing was conducted in English. There was a statistically significant L1…

Cunningham and Stanovich reported a longitudinal investigation over 10 years that examined the unique influence of exposure to print in explaining individual differences on various measures of reading achievement and declarative (general) knowledge. The present study replicated their investigation with a larger number of participants and…

Investigations of early vocabulary production often employ a single method to measure children's word use. This study examined expressive vocabulary development in children aged 1;0-2;6 years through a combination of picture naming, caregiver report and language sampling. The participants were predominantly exposed to Maltese at home, with…

This study examines the relationship between complex oral language and phonological awareness in the preschool years. Specifically, the authors investigate the relationship between concurrent measures of oral narrative structure (based on measures of both story retell and generation), and measures of blending and elision in a sample of 89 children…

This study aimed at investigating the impact of extensive reading on improving reading proficiency. The study tried to find the effect of ER on EFL student's reading, vocabulary and grammar. The researcher designed two instruments; a program based on the extensive reading strategy and general test. Forty-one university students who study English…

The purpose of this study is to demonstrate how to integrate two in-house specialized corpora into a university-level English for Specific Purposes (ESP) course for nonnative speakers of English. The ESP course was an introductory level of wine tasting for Applied English Department students at a university specializing in hospitality in Taiwan.…

This paper presents the results of a case study based on an integrated skills approach using feature movies (DVDs) in EFL syllabi at the tertiary level. 100 students took part in the study and the data was collected through a three - section survey questionnaire: demographic items, 18 likert scale questions and an open-ended question. The data…

The investigators compared two techniques for teaching expressive vocabulary to late talkers: modeling with an expectant pause and modeling with an evoked child production. They also explored the influence of neighborhood density on children's real word learning. Three late talkers (ages 25-33 months) received two alternating vocabulary treatments…

Poor comprehenders have intact word-reading skills but struggle specifically with understanding what they read. We investigated whether two metalinguistic skills, morphological and syntactic awareness, are specifically related to poor reading comprehension by including separate and combined measures of each. We identified poor comprehenders…

Our goal was to investigate the growth of vocabulary and morphological awareness over time in the context of an intervention for kindergartners with different ability levels in these skills. Participants in this exploratory study were 108 children from schools serving socioeconomically disadvantaged neighborhoods. Results indicated that children…

This study investigates acquisition of second language (L2) vocabulary from reading a connected authentic text. Advanced and upper-intermediate L2 (English) participants read a long expository text for general understanding, with embedded critical vocabulary items (pseudowords). Explicit knowledge of the critical items was examined using a meaning…