This guide offers advice on the assessment of the language development abilities of bilingual preschool children. A brief review of general bilingual child language development, including mixing and loss or semilingualism, is followed by a review of current assessment practices. A language assessment procedure developed for the State of California…

This theme issue discusses family literacy in six articles, covering: (1) visions of family literacy from research and practice; (2) a family-to-family tutoring model (Susan Weinbeck); (3) a strengths learning model (Meta W. Potts); (4) the LVA/GTE (Literary Volunteers of America/General Telephone and Electronics Corporation) family literacy…

An analysis of language acquisition in English and Dutch focuses on a theory of phrase structure. It is argued that the previously posited phrase structure operations of projection and adjunction can be dispensed with in favor of the single operation of "merge." One version of merge is shown to account for a range of data from child English and…

New research on brain development has profound implications in the areas of child development and education. This review of the research describes how the brain develops to shape children's growing intelligence, addressing such questions as: (1) What are the brain's functions? (2) What are the critical or sensitive periods in brain development?…

Part of a larger study on pre-school children's ability to use the computer to create art, a study examined the language children used as they were exposed to and trained to use a computer software program. Subjects were 4 preschool children (4 or 5 years of age). Audio and video recordings of the children over 8 sessions yielded a total of 1,501…

The making of a book is an effective way to instill pride in authorship and to emphasize the importance of writing to children. This guide finds that the finished product (the book) capitalizes on the language background of each child, becomes an extension of the natural language of children, and teaches children to value their work and to take…

A child's need for formal communication may be as much an emotional need as a cognitive need. Several theories attempt to explain children's language development, including the theories developed by B. F. Skinner, Noam Chomsky, and J. Bruner. Most children typically follow a standard sequence of language development: crying and cooing, babbling,…

A study examines teacher's and children's interactions with the use of the writing journal in a pre-k classroom (ages 3 to 4). Eight pre-school children and three teachers in a university lab school were observed twice a week for 1-hour sessions over a 6-month period. The use of the writing journal was a part of the total learning environment…

This study examined parent-child relationships during intervention with 25 preschoolers having developmental disabilities. Both parent and child performances were analyzed on a series of behavioral attributes reflecting developmentally appropriate child goals, adult strategies, partnership goals, and potential interactive problems. Videotaped…

A study examined the effects of adult-interactive behaviors during repeated storybook readings upon the language development and selected prereading skills of prekindergarten at-risk students. A total of 53 inner city, low socioeconomic status subjects participated in the 20-week study. Subjects were dichotomized at the median on a measure of…

Based on a two-day presentation workshop on early reading and writing approaches, the 12 essays in this book discuss the development of literacy, natural approaches in developing literacy, and supporting literacy development. Essays in the book are: (1) "Theories of Natural Language" (Carolyn N. Hedley); (2) "Oral Language…

This book provides a collection of interrelated essays on language for teachers concerned with first and second language acquisition, non-standard English, the teaching of grammar, language change, and the attainment of literacy. A problem-oriented text, the book presents the various controversies surrounding each language area, offering competing…

A study explored the use of television by immigrant children in terms of language learning, investigating whether immigrant children watch television for purposes of language learning and whether they learn language through TV viewing. Unstructured interviews were conducted with eight Chinese immigrant children and seven of their mothers. The…

A discussion of research on naturalistic second language acquisition (SLA) focuses on its relationship to the foreign language classroom context. It is argued that to attempt to relate natural SLA to classroom foreign language learning (FLL), a coherent and consistent theoretical framework is needed. The Cognitive-Interactionist Model is developed…

Sentence comprehension is more than a syntactically autonomous issue and relies on the clues that are not part of the grammar. This paper considers "world knowledge," in this case prior knowledge of the story being read, as one such clue. In section 1, "reversibility" of sentences is discussed. "Sentence ambiguity" is discussed in section 2.…