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From the Reading Rug to the Play Center: Enhancing Vocabulary and Comprehensive Language Skills by Connecting Storybook Reading and Guided Play
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This article explores the preschool teachers’ use of concrete and abstract comments and questions within the classroom contexts of storybook reading and guided play to promote classroom conversations. Early childhood educators promote oral language development by creating a language-rich environment in which children become active participants in classroom dialogue. Teachers must intentionally plan and scaffold this learning through interactive storybook reading and storybook extensions using props through guided play. This article provides examples of the types of comments and questions that can serve to model and facilitate children’s vocabulary and comprehensive language development and subsequent literacy skills.
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... In early childhood education, the learning value of decontextualised talk has been wellestablished (Massey 2013;Snow, Tabors, and Dickinson 2001;van Kleeck 2014). Decontextualised talk 'challenges children to communicate about topics that are not grounded in the here and now' (Rowe and Snow 2020, 12). ...
... A small number of studies have discussed how educators can promote preschoolers' learning through decontextualised talk. Massey (2013) and Rowe and Snow (2020) suggest that educators can intentionally co-construct decontextualised talk in conversations with children by 'springboarding' from the immediate activity or visual clues provided in picture books. Massey (2013) proposes a scale of decontextualisation comprising four levels of abstraction. ...
... Massey (2013) and Rowe and Snow (2020) suggest that educators can intentionally co-construct decontextualised talk in conversations with children by 'springboarding' from the immediate activity or visual clues provided in picture books. Massey (2013) proposes a scale of decontextualisation comprising four levels of abstraction. On the two lower levels, educators expand 'upon the concrete knowledge by further describing characteristics of objects' (126) or other perceptible aspects in the immediate context. ...
In early childhood centres, decontextualised talk is often associated with literacy activities. In this study, however, we investigated toddler-educator conversations across various activities with a focus on those about topics that were not related to the immediate context. We examined the communicative purposes and linguistic features of these conversations and the opportunities they afford for toddlers’ learning. A qualitative analysis of video-recorded conversations between 12 2-year-old toddlers and their educators resulted in identifying four kinds of talk: ‘interview’, ‘story’, ‘inquiry’ and ‘rebuttal’. The findings reveal that toddler–educator conversations provide varied learning opportunities for toddlers, which are reinforced by both educators’ and toddlers’ conversational contributions. The participants’ contributions are shaped by the extent to which a topic is removed from their immediate activity. These findings can inform more effective use of linguistic features, such as questions and narrative constructions, for supporting under-3-year-old children’s learning and developing skills in using decontextualised talk.
... Finally, children participated in a hands-on activity targeting the mathematics-related terms and concepts in the story. This activity gave children opportunities for further exploration of the concepts and vocabulary terms encountered during the read-aloud time (Massey, 2013). We developed a variety of activity ideas and included these suggestions in the TEMPLE Read-Aloud materials (see Figure 3). ...
Read-alouds provide teachers with an efficacious method for introducing vocabulary and content to young children. In this study, kindergarten teachers were randomly assigned to implement a mathematics-focused extended read-aloud program called TEMPLE (Teaching Early Math by Providing Language Exploration) with kindergarten children ages 5–6 (19 teachers with 169 children) or to a business-as-usual (BaU) condition (17 teachers and 146 children). With TEMPLE, teachers used read-alouds with storybooks to introduce mathematics vocabulary and content with each read-aloud accompanied by a brief mathematics activity for a period of up to 18 weeks. At posttest, TEMPLE children demonstrated an advantage on two measures of mathematics, but the difference between TEMPLE and BaU children was not significant. In an analysis related to implementation fidelity, we identified a positive and significant association between the number of book readings that TEMPLE teachers reported and scores on one of the mathematics measures. Limited implementation of the program may have led to these results.
... This is where a teacher sets up intentional learning targets for each centre. Guided play is structured to directly teach academic skills and concepts (Massey, 2013). Each item in the centre is put there for an intended purpose. ...
Play-based learning is a pedagogical approach that emphasises the use of play in promoting multiple areas of children’s development and learning. Free and guided play are two types of play-based learning that guide early learning. The children acquire concepts, skills, and attitudes that lay the foundation for lifelong learning through play pedagogies. Exposing learners to a rich vocabulary through reading, story-telling, and social interaction is key in play-based learning. This research aimed to explore the impact of play-based learning on the development of children in mobile Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE) centres. Social constructivism theory was used to understand the impact of play-passed learning on children’s development in ECE. Using convenience sampling, the research followed an interpretive qualitative case study, and eight (8) practitioners were selected to participate. Data sources included practitioners’ interviews and the centres’ observations. Using the thematic approach, the findings revealed that the practitioners in rural areas had an insufficient understanding of teaching using play pedagogies. This had a negative impact on standard provisions for play pedagogies suited for young children, where appropriate suggestions are offered to the practitioners on the planning, implementation, and support of play practices within early learning. Furthermore, there is a shift in the early learning curricula incorporating advanced academic skills, a beneficial tool to aid children’s learning and development.
... For example, many previously mentioned vocabulary studies were effective because play provides opportunities for rich dialogue and high-quality conversations with teachers and peers (Goldstein et al. 2017;Myers and Ankrum 2018; Seven et al. 2020). Experts in various academic disciplines agree that play is foundational for young children to engage with the world and others around them to learn and develop conceptual and practical knowledge, including literacy skills and expanded vocabularies (Cook et al. 2011;Dore et al. 2015;Han et al. 2010;Massey 2013;Ramani and Siegler 2008). Play is imperative in the healthy development of young children's cognition, neural plasticity, readiness to work within social norms, and meeting desired learning outcomes (e.g., Bartlett 2011;Fisher et al. 2011;Gilbert et al. 2011;Pellis et al. 2014;Weisberg et al. 2013). ...
... Salah satu kegiatan yang dapat menumbukan kegemaran dalam membaca siswa yaitu melalui kegiatan literasi. Membaca juga akan membuat kosakata siswa berkembang, pengalaman dengan kata-kata ini membantu anak-anak dalam mengembangkan pemahaman konkret tentang dunia mereka dan kemudian diterapkan pengetahuan itu pada konsep yang lebih abstrak sebagai pacuan berkembangnya pengetahuan mereka (Massey, 2013). ...
div align="center"> Abstract: This research was aimed to produced a new products in the form of storybooks with a focus on Theme 1, namely the Beautifulness of Togetherness in the Subtema of Cultural Diversity in My Country to improve the ability to read and write fourth grade students. The development model used in this study is Dick & Carey. The selection of the development model is based on goal-oriented and results that can be used to create an optimal learning. The Dick & Carey development model has 10 stages in development. In this study only use until the 9th stage, because in this story book does not provide summative evaluation. Abstrak: Penelitian ini bertujuan untuk menghasilkan produk baru berupa buku cerita dengan fokus pada Tema 1 yaitu Indahnya Kebersamaan Subtema Keberagaman Budaya Bangsaku untuk meningkatkan kemampuan membaca dan menulis siswa kelas IV SD. Model pengembangan yang digunakan pada penelitian ini adalah Dick & Carey. Pemilihan model pengembangan tersebut didasarkan oleh berorientasi pada tujuan serta hasil yang dapat digunakan untuk menciptakan sebuah pembelajaran yang optimal. Model pengembangan Dick & Carey mempunyai 10 tahapan dalam pengembangan. Pada penelitian ini hanya menggunakan sampai pada tahap kesembilan saja dikarenakan pada buku cerita ini tidak menyediakan evaluasi sumatif. </div
... Lever and Sénéchal (2011) determined that children who received dialogic story reading intervention performed better in narrative ability and expressive vocabulary knowledge. Massey (2013) also concluded that through interactive storytelling incorporated scaffolding instruction help young children promote their oral language development. Furthermore, Mokhtar et al. (2011) identified the positive effects of storytelling on students' communication ability. ...
The purpose of this pilot study was to evaluate the effect of Story Telling and retelling and higher order thinking for English Language and Literacy Acquisition (STELLA) on the English oral proficiency of elementary students in Mainland China and Taiwan, where English is taught as a foreign language. The 6-week intervention incorporated direct vocabulary instruction, modeling reading, and leveled questioning strategy through storytelling and retelling, and was delivered by certified English teachers who received weekly virtual professional training in two public schools in Mainland China and Taiwan. An English oral vocabulary measure was administered among 10 students in Mainland China and 9 students in Taiwan before and after the intervention. Paired-sample T-tests were conducted to examine the progress from pretest to posttest on the two cohorts, respectively. The results showed a significant improvement on students’ oral proficiency at both sites.
This study provides estimates for the impact of centre-based care participation during pre-kindergarten on Latino children’s academic readiness skills at kindergarten-entry. Using the ECLS-K:2011 dataset, findings indicate that Latino children who participated in centre-based care during their pre-kindergarten year had significantly higher English oral language (ES = 0.112, p < .05), reading (ES = 0.151, p < .001), and math scores (ES = 0.117, p < .05) than their peers who did not participate in such programmes. Additionally, children from lower SES homes especially benefitted in terms of oral language skills from participating in centre-based care. These results suggest that efforts should be made to increase the participation of Latino children in centre-based preschool, which can play a role in increasing their academic readiness skills.
Résumé Un nombre important de recherches actuelles observe des relations -de modérées à fortes- entre les mesures de vocabulaire oral et de celles de compréhension en lecture. Cette recherche a pour objectif de préciser notre compréhension des interactions entre le langage oral et le langage écrit en examinant la nature du lien entretenu par le vocabulaire oral et la compréhension en lecture avec des définitions et des mesures plus précises de différents composants du vocabulaire qui sont également motivés théoriquement. Différents composants du système de vocabulaire oral ont ainsi été définis et évalués séparément à partir de modèles du lexique qui distinguent le nombre d’entrées lexicales (l’étendue du vocabulaire) et l’étendue des connaissances sémantiques (profondeur du vocabulaire). Le concept de profondeur du vocabulaire a été développé de sorte à inclure à la fois des mesures de définition de mots et de conscience des associations entre mots ; cette dernière mesure étant destinée à évaluer l’organisation du système lexico-sémantique. Des tests de connaissances en vocabulaire ainsi que des tests de conscience phonémique, de lecture de mots et de compréhension en lecture ont été administrés à 100 élèves de 6 e année. Les résultats ont montré que les performances de compréhension en lecture sont influencées directement par celles de conscience phonémique, de lecture de mots et d’étendue du vocabulaire et, indirectement, par celles relatives à l’organisation lexico-sémantique qui prédisent une part unique de variance en lecture de mots. Ces résultats reflètent la complexité des relations entretenues par le vocabulaire oral et la compréhension de textes écrits, et soulignent la pertinence des mesures d’étendue et de profondeur du vocabulaire dans l’explication des différences individuelles en lecture.
The effects of a book reading technique called interactive book reading on the language and literacy development of 4-year-olds from low-income families were evaluated. Teachers read books to children and reinforced the vocabulary in the books by presenting concrete objects that represented the words and by providing children with multiple opportunities to use the book-related words. The teachers also were trained to ask open-ended questions and to engage children in conversations about the book and activities. This provided children with opportunities to use language and learn vocabulary in a meaningful context. Children who were in the interactive book reading intervention group scored significantly better than children in the comparison group on Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test-M and other measures of receptive and expressive language. Book reading and related activities can promote the development of language and literacy skills in young children.
A corpus of nearly 150,000 maternal word-tokens used by 53 low-income mothers in 263 mother-child conversations in 5 settings (e.g., play. mealtime, and book readings) was studied, Ninety-nine percent of maternal lexical input consisted of the 3,000 most frequent words. Children's vocabulary performance in kindergarten and later in 2nd grade related more to the occurrence of sophisticated lexical items than to quantity of lexical input overall. Density of sophisticated words heard and the density with which such words were embedded in helpful or instructive interactions, at age 5 at home, independently predicted over a third of the variance in children's vocabulary performance in both kindergarten and 2nd grade. These two variables, with controls for maternal education, child nonverbal IQ, and amount of child's talk produced during the interactive settings, at age 5, predicted 50% of the variance in children's 2nd-grade vocabulary.
To reach the national goal that all children in the United States will read at an appropriate level by the end of third grade, the Center for the Improvement of Early Reading Achievement (CIERA) has studied the reading growth of children in preschool and primary classes, both in and out of school. Our framework suggests that children need to develop their knowledge of language and the ability to recognize words fluently so that they can understand the books they read. CIERA's work has attempted to explicate how this development occurs and how supportive learning environments can foster it, especially for high-poverty and linguistically diverse children. This article reviews our work in early language development and literacy assessment and the development of word-recognition abilities, in the environments of preschools, primary-grade classes, and home-school connections, with the intention of understanding how these environments can more effectively provide the support needed for all children to attain success as readers and writers.