Certain tasks are more likely to be solved by groups than by individuals, even when the individuals are highly skilled at aspects of the task. These are tasks such as filling out income tax forms or performing surgical operations, for which inputs from several individuals who have complementary domains of knowledge and skill are needed. I refer to…

This study evaluates the relationships between aspects of Chilean teachers' explicit vocabulary instruction and students' vocabulary development in kindergarten. Classroom videotapes of whole-class instruction gathered during a randomized experimental evaluation of a coaching-based professional development program were analyzed. The amount of…

This cluster-randomized controlled study examined dual language learners (DLLs) in Norway who received a book-based language intervention program. About 464 DLLs aged 3-5 years in 123 early childhood classrooms participated in the study. The children were acquiring Norwegian as their second language in preschool and spoke a variety of first…

In the present study, 81 Norwegian students were taught the meaning of words by the Word Generation (WG) method and 51 Norwegian students were taught by an approach inspired by the Thinking Schools (TS) concept. Two sets of words were used: a set of words to be trained and a set of non-trained control words. The two teaching methods yielded no…

How does literacy develop in children's early years, and what programs or practices promote adequate literacy for all children? These are the questions Catherine Snow and Timothy Matthews tackle in this article. Fundamental literacy skills can be grouped into two categories, Snow and Matthews write. The first category is "constrained"…

First language learners acquire vocabulary in the context of participation in discourse, and the quantity and richness of that discourse is the best predictor of their progress. Similarly, we argue, engagement in discourse, in particular debate and discussion, is an effective component of classroom instruction for second and foreign language…

Two ways of measuring change are presented and compared: A conventional "change score", defined as the difference between scores before and after an interim period, and a process-oriented approach focusing on detailed analysis of conceptually defined response patterns. The validity of the two approaches was investigated. Vocabulary…

Communicative self-efficacy serves as an important link between discussing controversial issues and civic engagement because confidence in one's discourse skills is important to managing conflicting perspectives and developing solutions to community-based problems. Freely available to schools, "Word Generation" is a cross-content…

Students who struggle with reading comprehension in middle school often lack the academic vocabulary the need to understand grade-level textbooks and other instructional materials. Research shows that to learn a new word well, students need to encounter and use it multiple times in different contexts. The authors describe Word Generation, a…