Only a few characteristics of picture-based narrative prompts have been studied to determine what features affect task performance. Thus, it is not easy to identify equivalent narrative prompts or identify features that are impactful. Tavakoli and Foster (2008) and Tavakoli (2009) examined the impact of prompt on the language produced by English…

Background: Children with specific language impairment (SLI) often experience word-learning difficulties, which are suggested to originate in the early stage of word learning: fast mapping. Some previous research indicates significantly poorer fast mapping capabilities in children with SLI compared with typically developing (TD) counterparts, with…

This study investigated the effectiveness of various types of worked-out examples used in pre-training to optimize the cognitive load and enhance learners' comprehension of the content in an animation-based learning environment. An animation-based learning environment was developed specifically for this study. The participants were divided into…

Research Findings: In 2 experiments, we tested whether children generalize psychological and biological properties to novel foods. We used an induction task in which a property (either biological or psychological) was associated with a target food. Children were then asked whether a taxonomically related and a script-related food would also have…

This study examines the morphosyntactic development, specifically verb morphology, of typically-developing Bangla-speaking children between the ages of two and four. Three verb forms were studied: the Present Simple, the Present Progressive and the Past Progressive. The study was motivated by the observations that reliable language-specific…

Lexical sound symbolism in language appears to exploit the feature associations embedded in cross-sensory correspondences. For example, words incorporating relatively high acoustic frequencies (i.e., front/close rather than back/open vowels) are deemed more appropriate as names for concepts associated with brightness, lightness in weight,…

The present study investigated the impact of pronunciation training on the learning and retention of second language (L2) grammatical structures. By drawing on the phonological saliency of stress placement in German separable- and inseparable-prefix verbs, the study explored whether enhancing explicit instruction through pronunciation training can…

Oral language exams at university often consist of an individual or group conversation with the examiner about topics dealt with during the semester. A question-and-answer format is applied and vocabulary and structures tested. As a consequence, the oral exam does not reflect action-oriented approaches that often form part of classroom activities…

To adult humans, the task of forming an impression of another social being seems effortless and even obligatory. In 2 experiments, we offer the first systematic cross-cultural examination of impression formation in European American and East Asian preschool children. Children across both cultures easily inferred basic personality traits, such as…

The present study examined the use of prosody in semantic and syntactic disambiguation by means of comparison between Japanese and Chinese speakers' production of English sentences. In Chinese and Japanese, lexical prosody is more prominent than sentence prosody, and the sentential meaning contrast is usually realized through particles or a change…

The aim of this study is to investigate the influence of content knowledge on students' socio-scientific argumentation in the Swedish National Assessment in biology, chemistry and physics for 12-year-olds. In Sweden, the assessment of socio-scientific argumentation has been a major part of the National Assessment during three consecutive years and…

Knowledge of derivational morphology is considered an important aspect of vocabulary knowledge both in L1 (mother tongue) and L2 (second or foreign language) English language learning. However, it is still not clear whether different derivational affixes vary in their (learning) difficulty. The present study examines whether Bauer and Nation's…

Comprehensive early childhood teacher preparation programs offer courses and curricula that are aligned with current research on best practices and related to the knowledge and skills that early childhood teacher candidates are expected to demonstrate on certification exams and teacher performance assessments. To support the alignment of early…

Engaging students in meaningful applications of their knowledge is a key aspect of both addressing the standards and providing greater access. Not only do the standards emphasize the importance of meaningful engagement in real-world tasks, but evidence shows that engagement is strongly related to student performance on assessment tasks, especially…

This paper outlines a framework to explain the early development of place-value understanding based on an analysis of data from 84 five- to seven-year-old children from diverse cultural and linguistic backgrounds. The children were assessed individually on number knowledge tasks (recalled facts, subitizing, counting, place-value understanding) and…