In this paper we investigate the effect of variable input on the acquisition of grammar. More specifically, we examine the acquisition of the third person singular marker -s on the auxiliary "do" in comprehension and production in two groups of children who are exposed to similar varieties of English but that differ with respect to adult…

This study investigated how infants perceive and interpret human body movement. We recorded the eye movements and pupil sizes of 9- and 12-month-old infants and of adults (N = 14 per group) as they observed animation clips of biomechanically possible and impossible arm movements performed by a human and by a humanoid robot. Both 12-month-old…

The present study builds upon research in the CAF (complexity, accuracy, fluency) framework for examining learner performance to compare the lexical and syntactic complexity of learner output in spoken discourse and synchronous computer-mediated communication (SCMC) during completion of narrative tasks. Data were generated from transcripts and…

Seventy-nine 3- and 4-year-old children were tested on gaze-reporting ability and Wellman and Liu's (2004) continuous measure of theory of mind (ToM). Children were better able to report where someone was looking when eye and head direction were provided as a cue compared with when only eye direction cues were provided. With the exception of…

It has been difficult to differentiate attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and autism spectrum disorder (ASD) in terms of some aspects of their cognitive profile. While both show deficits in executive functions, it has been suggested that they may differ in their response to monetary reward. For instance, children with ADHD prefer…

The recent increase in use of digital devices such as laptop computers, iPads, and web-enabled cell phones has generated concern about how technologies affect student performance. Combining observation, survey, and interview data, this research assesses the effects of technology use on student attitudes and learning. Data were gathered in eight…

What is the common goal of our school? Why is this important? How does this build community? What are Professional Learning Communities (PLCs) and where does the library media program fit in? All these questions swirled in the author's head during the first few months they were opening their new middle school. She had been hired as the school…

Background: Attention biases toward threat are often detected in individuals with anxiety disorders. Threat biases can be measured experimentally through dot-probe paradigms, in which individuals detect a probe following a stimulus pair including a threat. On these tasks, individuals with anxiety tend to detect probes that occur in a location…

The current study adopts the PASS theory of information processing to investigate the probable differences in specific motor and cognitive abilities between children with and without developmental coordination disorder (DCD). Participants were 108 5- and 6-year-old preschoolers (54 children with DCD and 54 children without DCD). The Movement…

The relation between event apprehension and utterance formulation was examined in children and adults. English-speaking adults and 4-year-olds viewed motion events while their eye movements were monitored. Half of the participants in each age group described each event (Linguistic task), whereas the other half studied the events for an upcoming…

We report on the work of 3 schools which set out to make a difference for their previously low-attaining students. Through naturalistic enquiry over 3 years, we built a picture of their practices. Against a national trend, students reported positive attitudes to mathematics and, in 2 out of 3 schools, showed improvement in attainment, so we probe…

In this paper, we validate Macaro's (2006) model of strategy use among language learners by assessing the amount of neural activity around the prefrontal cortex, the supposed locus of working memory (WM). We also examine whether WM activation during first language (L1) strategy deployment is lower than WM activation during second language (L2)…

The study examined the acquisition of two morphological procedures of noun pluralization in Palestinian Arabic: "Sound Feminine Plural" (SFP) and "Broken Plural" (BP). We tested if noun pluralization was affected by (1) the type of morphological procedure, (2) the degree of familiarity with the singular noun stem, and (3) the…

This article presents the concept of creative potential and its link to talent. Psychological measures to assess creative potential in children and adolescents (EPoC) and adults (Creative Profiler) are then described. Implications for developing creativity are proposed.

Previous research has shown that the degree of structure in a task affects the complexity, accuracy, and fluency of L2 oral production (Foster & Skehan 1999). The acquisition of pragmatic markers may be related to the development of second language fluency, but there is limited research on their use by second language learners on different…