The digital age is changing our children’s lives and childhood dramatically. New technologies transform the way people interact with each other, the way stories are shared and distributed, and the way reality is presented and perceived. Parents experience that toddlers can handle tablets and apps with a level of sophistication the children’s grandparents can only envy. The question of how the ecology of the child affects the acquisition of competencies and skills has been approached from different angles in different disciplines. In linguistics, psychology and neuroscience, the central question addressed concerns the specific role of exposure to language. Two influential types of theory have been proposed. On one view the capacity to learn language is hard-wired in the human brain: linguistic input is merely a trigger for language to develop. On an alternative view, language acquisition depends on the linguistic environment of the child, and specifically on language input provided through child-adult communication and interaction. The latter view further specifies that factors in situated interaction are crucial for language learning to take place. In the fields of information technology, artificial intelligence and robotics a current theme is to create robots that develop, as children do, and to establish how embodiment and interaction support language learning in these machines. In the field of human-machine interaction, research is investigating whether using a physical robot, rather than a virtual agent or a computer-based video, has a positive effect on language development. The Research Topic will address the following issues: - What are the methodological challenges faced by research on language acquisition in the digital age? - How should traditional theories and models of language acquisition be revised to account for the multimodal and multichannel nature of language learning in the digital age? - How should existing and future technologies be developed and transformed so as to be most beneficial for child language learning and cognition? - Can new technologies be tailored to support child growth, and most importantly, can they be designed in order to enhance specifically vulnerable children’s language learning environment and opportunities? - What kind of learning mechanisms are involved? - How can artificial intelligence and robotics technologies, as robot tutors, support language development? These questions and issues can only be addressed by means of an interdisciplinary approach that aims at developing new methods of data collection and analysis in cross-sectional and longitudinal perspectives. We welcome contributions addressing these questions from an interdisciplinary perspective both theoretically and empirically.
The Handbook of Research on Teaching Literacy Through the Communicative and Visual Arts, a comprehensive overview of research on this topic, extends conceptualizations of literacy to include all of the communicative arts (reading, writing, speaking, listening, viewing) and the visual arts of drama, dance, film, art, video, and computer technology.
This volume provides a comprehensive and in-depth analysis of the contribution of multiparty intergenerational talk in a variety of cultures to the development of children's communicative capacities. The book focuses on the complexity of the cultural and interactional contexts in which pragmatic learning occurs and re-examines certain assumptions implicit in research on language socialization to date, such as primacy of dyadic interactions in the early ages and the presupposition of a monolingual social matrix. One of the aims of the book is to demonstrate the degree of cultural diversity in paths of pragmatic development. Individual chapters present empirically grounded analyses of talk with children of all ages, in different participation structures and in a variety of cultures. In pursuing this theme the volume is meant to further enrich cross-cultural perspectives on language socialization by providing in each of its chapters an empirically grounded analysis of the development of one specific dimension of discursive skill. The nine invited chapters comprise new empirical work on the development of specific discourse dimensions. Authors have been asked also to adopt a reflexive stand on their line of research and to incorporate in the chapter a comprehensive and critical perspective on former work on the discursive dimension investigated. The discourse dimensions represented in the volume include narratives, explanations, the language of control in intergenerational and intragenerational talk, the language of humor and affect, and bilingual conversations. The volume offers a rich spectrum of cultural variety in pragmatic development, including studies of American, Greek, Japanese, Mayan, Norwegian, and Swedish children and families.
First published in 1986. The present volume is the outcome of a symposium on Gestures, Cultures and Communication, held in May 1982 at Victoria College, University of Toronto. This conference, one of a series of five colloquia which took place during the Third International Summer Institute for Semiotic and Structural Studies, was organized by the Toronto Semiotic Circle. The purpose of the 1982 conference was to explore the biological basis of gestures by bringing together investigators working mainly in the fields of anthropology, neurophysiology, neuropsychology and psycholinguistics.
This book provides a synthesis of work on communication disorders of child and adult users of signed languages. The chapters investigate linguistic impairments caused by deficits in visual processing and motor movements, as well as neurological decline. The volume also contains in-depth descriptions of child language acquisition in the signed modality and suggestions about how signed languages might guard against communication disorder.
Throughout history there have been efforts to help deaf children develop spoken language through which they could have full access to the hearing world. These efforts, although pursued seriously and with great care, frequently proved fruitless, and often only resulted in passionate arguments over the efficacy of particular approaches. Although some deaf children did develop spoken language, there was little evidence to suggest that this development had been facilitated by any particular education approach, and moreover, many, even most deaf children--especially those with profound loss--never develop spoken language at all. Recent technological advances, however, have led to more positive expectations for deaf children's acquisition of spoken language: Innovative testing procedures for hearing allow for early identification of loss that leads to intervention services during the first weeks and months of life. Programmable hearing aids allow more children to make use of residual hearing abilities. Children with the most profound losses are able to reap greater benefits from cochlear-implant technologies. At the same time, there have been great advances in research into the processes of deaf children's language development and the outcomes they experience. As a result, we are, for the first time, accruing a sufficient base of evidence and information to allow reliable predictions about children's progress that will, in turn, lead to further advances. The contributors to this volume are recognized leaders in this research, and here they present the latest information on both the new world evolving for deaf and hard-of-hearing children and the improved expectations for their acquisition of spoken language. Chapters cover topics such as the significance of early vocalizations, the uses and potential of technological advances, and the cognitive processes related to spoken language. The contributors provide objective information from children in a variety of programming: using signs; using speech only; using cued speech, and cutting-edge information on the language development of children using cochlear implants and the innovations in service provision. Along with its companion volume, Advances in Sign-Language Development of Deaf Children, this book will provide a deep and broad picture of what is known about deaf children's language development in a variety of situations and contexts. From this base of information, progress in research and its application will accelerate, and barriers to deaf children's full participation in the world around them will continue to be overcome.
Grammaticalization and lexicalization are at the heart of first language acquisition. Understanding how these processes begin and evolve is a major challenge for current theories and has implications for applications in teaching or clinical contexts. This volume examines the relative weight of cognitive and linguistic determinants of acquisition with particular attention to two questions. The first one concerns the origins of grammar and the processes underlying its development. Is grammatical knowledge innate or constructed by the child? Is it modular or does it interact with other capacities? How can we account for continuity and discontinuity in development? What is the role of input? Second, considerable variation is observed in lexical and grammatical development across child languages. Is the process of acquisition similar in all children or do language-specific factors impact its rhythm and course? Do typological factors determine children’s reliance on lexical or grammatical means of expression in some domains? Originally published in Language, Interaction and Acquisition - Langage, Interaction et Acquisition 2:1 (2011).
Featuring chapters by the world's foremost scholars in music education and cognition, this handbook is a convenient collection of current research on music teaching and learning. This comprehensive work includes sections on arts advocacy, music and medicine, teacher education, and studio instruction, among other subjects, making it an essential reference for music education programs. The original Handbook of Research on Music Teaching and Learning, published in 1992 with the sponsorship of the Music Educators National Conference (MENC), was hailed as "a welcome addition to the literature on music education because it serves to provide definition and unity to a broad and complex field" (Choice). This new companion volume, again with the sponsorship of MENC, explores the significant changes in music and arts education that have taken place in the last decade. Notably, several chapters now incorporate insights from other fields to shed light on multi-cultural music education, gender issues in music education, and non-musical outcomes of music education. Other chapters offer practical information on maintaining musicians' health, training music teachers, and evaluating music education programs. Philosophical issues, such as musical cognition, the philosophy of research theory, curriculum, and educating musically, are also explored in relationship to policy issues. In addition to surveying the literature, each chapter considers the significance of the research and provides suggestions for future study.Covering a broad range of topics and addressing the issues of music education at all age levels, from early childhood to motivation and self-regulation, this handbook is an invaluable resource for music teachers, researchers, and scholars.
How we raise young children is one of today's most highly personalized and sharply politicized issues, in part because each of us can claim some level of "expertise." The debate has intensified as discoveries about our development-in the womb and in the first months and years-have reached the popular media. How can we use our burgeoning knowledge to assure the well-being of all young children, for their own sake as well as for the sake of our nation? Drawing from new findings, this book presents important conclusions about nature-versus-nurture, the impact of being born into a working family, the effect of politics on programs for children, the costs and benefits of intervention, and other issues. The committee issues a series of challenges to decision makers regarding the quality of child care, issues of racial and ethnic diversity, the integration of children's cognitive and emotional development, and more. Authoritative yet accessible, From Neurons to Neighborhoods presents the evidence about "brain wiring" and how kids learn to speak, think, and regulate their behavior. It examines the effect of the climate-family, child care, community-within which the child grows.