was that television could help children learn in their homes (Fisch & Truglio, 2001a; Pecora, 200... more was that television could help children learn in their homes (Fisch & Truglio, 2001a; Pecora, 2007). Researchers knew children were watching a lot of television and sought to maximize the benefits of viewing by capitalizing on the technology's most engaging traitsquality writing, production value, etc. (Palmer & Fisch, 2001). The rise of interactive technologies provides a chance to expand children's informal learning opportunities in a new domain, if the capabilities and features of these products are welldesigned with regards to children's physical, social, and cognitive development. Considering the increased affordability and availability of interactive toys and the increased time children are spending with them (Rideout et al., 2006; Rideout et al., 2003), there are frequent opportunities for informal learning. The Role of Emergent Literacy One of the critical areas for informal learning is building emergent literacy skills. Distinct from literacy perspectives that see formal school-based instruction as the beginning of reading acquisition, emergent literacy refers to the developmental antecedents of formal reading, covering literacy-related behaviors that occur prior to formal schooling (Whitehurst & Lonigan, 1998). There are many components of emergent literacy, including children's semantic and conceptual knowledge of language, an understanding of the conventions of print (in English, reading left to right and top to bottom), knowledge of letters, and an awareness of linguistic units such as phonemes, syllables, and words (Whitehurst & Lonigan, 1998). Two interdependent domains of literacy are key to children's emergent literacy: outside-in and inside-out skills (Whitehurst & Lonigan, 1998, 2001). Outside-in information refers to sources of 4 information that exist outside printed text that support print understanding, such as vocabulary, conceptual knowledge, and story schemas. To understand a sentence in a storybook, a child might need outside knowledge of the world, semantic knowledge, and knowledge of the context in which the sentence was embedded. Inside-out information refers to information within text that aids in decoding print into sound and sound into language, such as letter knowledge or phonemic awareness. The ability to integrate information from both domains contributes to successful reading. Low levels of emergent literacy in preschool children are not a cause for concern in and of themselves; children with lagging skills can still learn to read (National Research Council, 1998; Whitehurst & Lonigan, 1998). However, the reason emergent literacy skills are vital is that, "schools provide an age-graded rather than skills-graded curriculum in which early delays are magnified at each additional step as the gap increases between what children bring to the curriculum and what the curriculum demands" (Whitehurst & Lonigan, 1998, p. 865). The National Reading Panel (2000) and National Research Council (1998) have found that children who have insufficient reading skills early are less likely to catch up to the reading skills of their peers, with deleterious academic effects. Literacy trajectories are established early; children who enter school with deficient early literacy experiences are more likely to follow a negative developmental pattern, falling behind in critical skills like automaticity and understanding alphabetic principles (Crijnen, Feehan, & Kellam, 1998; Stanovich, 1986). Additionally, these children are less likely to have enjoyable reading experiences, resulting in decreased motivation and fewer exposures to print. Differences between poor 132 APPENDIX C Parent Behaviors Device Labeling / Vocabulary Development Assists child in developing new use of vocabulary words. Says or provides a label for (1) an object, (2) a person, (3) a place, (4) a qualifier, or (5) an action word. Asks a why, what, where, or how question. Says or provides a word or phrase close in meaning to another word already used. Verbal Expression (parent) Models verbal fluency. Expands upon child's utterance, providing a more complete sentence structure. Validates child's utterance by repeating the child's word or saying "yes,," "oh,," or "uh huh." Comments on the story as she reads. Prior Knowledge Questions or comments so as to encourage child to recall a previous experience or prior knowledge. Encourages child to make judgments about the story (based on prior knowledge). Helps child to recall a previous experience related to the story. Book Structure Assists child in developing awareness of the book's physical organization or story narrative. Calls attention to parts of the book such as author, illustrator, and cover pages. Identifies cause and effect relations or chains of events that relate to the main narrative. Leads a summary of story events. (Tangential or merely descriptive comments should be ruled out.) Encourages child's retelling of parts of the story.
Abstract As technology access and use increases in early childhood classrooms and at home, there ... more Abstract As technology access and use increases in early childhood classrooms and at home, there is an increased need to support students’ understanding of how to be safe, responsible, and cooperative digital media users. While teaching media literacy in education has some historical context, it is only relatively recently that school districts have expanded their efforts to teach other digital citizenship competencies, including internet safety, media balance, and digital footprint. The purpose of this paper is to use survey data of teachers to document how the teaching of digital citizenship competencies in elementary school varies based on factors such as demographics of the students and the amount of educator experience. Results from this descriptive study indicate that elementary educators are teaching digital citizenship as early as Kindergarten but not all competencies of digital citizenship are being taught equally. Additionally, early teaching of digital citizenship competencies is more likely to occur in suburban schools and schools with more racially-ethnically diverse students. These results have implications for education policies around supporting digital citizenship competencies starting early in formal schooling.
Experts have expressed concerns about the lack of evidence demonstrating that children's "educati... more Experts have expressed concerns about the lack of evidence demonstrating that children's "educational" applications (apps) have educational value. This study aimed to operationalize Hirsh-Pasek, Zosh, and colleagues' Four Pillars of Learning into a reliable coding scheme (Pillar 1: Active Learning, Pillar 2: Engagement in the Learning Process, Pillar 3: Meaningful Learning, Pillar 4: Social Interaction), describe the educational quality of commercially available apps, and examine differences in educational quality between free and paid apps. We analyzed 100 children's educational apps with the highest downloads from Google Play and Apple app stores, as well as 24 apps most frequently played by preschoolage children in a longitudinal cohort study. We developed a coding scheme in which each app earned a value of 0-3 for each Pillar, defining lower-quality apps as those scoring ≤4, summed across the Four Pillars. Overall scores were low across all Pillars. Free apps had significantly lower Pillar 2 (Engagement in Learning Process) scores (t-test, p < .0001) and overall scores (t-test, p < .0047) when compared to paid apps, due to the presence of distracting enhancements. These results highlight the need for improved design of educational apps guided by developmental science.
Television has become a nearly ubiquitous feature in children's cultural landscape. A review of t... more Television has become a nearly ubiquitous feature in children's cultural landscape. A review of the research into young children's learning from television indicates that the likelihood that children will learn from screen media is influenced by their developing social relationships with on-screen characters, as much as by their developing perception of the screen and their symbolic understanding and comprehension of information presented on screen. Considering the circumstances in which children under 6 years learn from screen media can inform teachers, parents, and researchers about the important nature of social interaction in early learning and development. The findings reviewed in this article suggest the social nature of learning, even learning from screen media.
To examine whether children between 12 and 25 months of age learn words from an infantdirected DV... more To examine whether children between 12 and 25 months of age learn words from an infantdirected DVD designed for that purpose. Design: Half of the children received a DVD to watch in their home over the course of 6 weeks. Setting: All participants returned to a laboratory for testing on vocabulary acquisition every 2 weeks. Participants: Ninety-six 12-to 24-month-old children. Main Exposure: Baby videos. Main Outcome Measures: Parent report and observational measures of vocabulary acquisition related to words highlighted in the DVD; parent report of general language development; and parent report of children's media use. Results: The age at first viewing of baby DVDs was related to children's general language development. There was no evidence of learning words highlighted in the infantdirected DVD independent of parental intervention. Conclusions: Researchers should continue to examine whether infant-directed media are effective in teaching infants and toddlers content and consider the cognitive factors related to whether very young viewers should be expected to learn from a DVD.
The Handbook of Children, Media, and Development, 2008
... Using children&amp;#x27;s self-reports via a similar diary method to that used by Lundber... more ... Using children&amp;#x27;s self-reports via a similar diary method to that used by Lundberg and his colleagues, Timmer, Eccles, and O&amp;#x27;Brien found ... As early as 1929, Walt Disney instituted a series of promotional activities to attract children to his movies; he instituted Mickey Mouse Clubs ...
Psychological science in the public interest : a journal of the American Psychological Society, 2015
Children are in the midst of a vast, unplanned experiment, surrounded by digital technologies tha... more Children are in the midst of a vast, unplanned experiment, surrounded by digital technologies that were not available but 5 years ago. At the apex of this boom is the introduction of applications ("apps") for tablets and smartphones. However, there is simply not the time, money, or resources available to evaluate each app as it enters the market. Thus, "educational" apps-the number of which, as of January 2015, stood at 80,000 in Apple's App Store (Apple, 2015)-are largely unregulated and untested. This article offers a way to define the potential educational impact of current and future apps. We build upon decades of work on the Science of Learning, which has examined how children learn best. From this work, we abstract a set of principles for two ultimate goals. First, we aim to guide researchers, educators, and designers in evidence-based app development. Second, by creating an evidence-based guide, we hope to set a new standard for evaluating and selectin...
... label, describe, and ask questions (Barr, Zack, Garcia, &amp; Muentener, 2008; DeLoache &... more ... label, describe, and ask questions (Barr, Zack, Garcia, &amp; Muentener, 2008; DeLoache &amp; DeMendoza, 1987; Fidler, Zack, and Barr, 2010; Namy, Acredolo, &amp; ... In contrast to a book reading interaction, in which the parent and/or child can set the pace of the interaction, the DVD ...
This study examined the relationship between viewing an infant DVD and expressive and receptive l... more This study examined the relationship between viewing an infant DVD and expressive and receptive language outcomes. Children between 12 and 15 months were randomly assigned to view Baby Wordsworth, a DVD highlighting words around the house marketed for children beginning at 12 months of age. Viewings took place in home settings over 6 weeks. After every 2 weeks and five exposures to the DVD, children were assessed on expressive and receptive communication measures. Results indicated there was no increased growth on either outcome for children who had viewed the DVD as compared to children in the control group, even after multiple exposures. After controlling for age, gender, cognitive developmental level, income, and parent education, the most significant predictor of vocabulary comprehension and production scores was the amount of time children were read to.
Baby media have exploded in the past decade, and children younger than 2 are showing increased us... more Baby media have exploded in the past decade, and children younger than 2 are showing increased use of these baby media. This paper examines the historical evidence of babies' use of television since the 1950s as well as the various factors that have given rise to the current increase in screen media for babies. We also consider the ubiquitous role of television in American families, the impact of evidence regarding the educational benefits of educational television on preschoolers, and positive parental beliefs about the usefulness of such educational media in preparing young children for schooling. Finally, we examine the theoretical issues of importance for guiding research into the interactions between media exposure and cognitive development, including the role of media in changing the context of children's development and constraints on the kinds of things babies can learn from screen media. Lastly, we suggest that screen media may indeed be changing the nature of children's development.
was that television could help children learn in their homes (Fisch & Truglio, 2001a; Pecora, 200... more was that television could help children learn in their homes (Fisch & Truglio, 2001a; Pecora, 2007). Researchers knew children were watching a lot of television and sought to maximize the benefits of viewing by capitalizing on the technology's most engaging traitsquality writing, production value, etc. (Palmer & Fisch, 2001). The rise of interactive technologies provides a chance to expand children's informal learning opportunities in a new domain, if the capabilities and features of these products are welldesigned with regards to children's physical, social, and cognitive development. Considering the increased affordability and availability of interactive toys and the increased time children are spending with them (Rideout et al., 2006; Rideout et al., 2003), there are frequent opportunities for informal learning. The Role of Emergent Literacy One of the critical areas for informal learning is building emergent literacy skills. Distinct from literacy perspectives that see formal school-based instruction as the beginning of reading acquisition, emergent literacy refers to the developmental antecedents of formal reading, covering literacy-related behaviors that occur prior to formal schooling (Whitehurst & Lonigan, 1998). There are many components of emergent literacy, including children's semantic and conceptual knowledge of language, an understanding of the conventions of print (in English, reading left to right and top to bottom), knowledge of letters, and an awareness of linguistic units such as phonemes, syllables, and words (Whitehurst & Lonigan, 1998). Two interdependent domains of literacy are key to children's emergent literacy: outside-in and inside-out skills (Whitehurst & Lonigan, 1998, 2001). Outside-in information refers to sources of 4 information that exist outside printed text that support print understanding, such as vocabulary, conceptual knowledge, and story schemas. To understand a sentence in a storybook, a child might need outside knowledge of the world, semantic knowledge, and knowledge of the context in which the sentence was embedded. Inside-out information refers to information within text that aids in decoding print into sound and sound into language, such as letter knowledge or phonemic awareness. The ability to integrate information from both domains contributes to successful reading. Low levels of emergent literacy in preschool children are not a cause for concern in and of themselves; children with lagging skills can still learn to read (National Research Council, 1998; Whitehurst & Lonigan, 1998). However, the reason emergent literacy skills are vital is that, "schools provide an age-graded rather than skills-graded curriculum in which early delays are magnified at each additional step as the gap increases between what children bring to the curriculum and what the curriculum demands" (Whitehurst & Lonigan, 1998, p. 865). The National Reading Panel (2000) and National Research Council (1998) have found that children who have insufficient reading skills early are less likely to catch up to the reading skills of their peers, with deleterious academic effects. Literacy trajectories are established early; children who enter school with deficient early literacy experiences are more likely to follow a negative developmental pattern, falling behind in critical skills like automaticity and understanding alphabetic principles (Crijnen, Feehan, & Kellam, 1998; Stanovich, 1986). Additionally, these children are less likely to have enjoyable reading experiences, resulting in decreased motivation and fewer exposures to print. Differences between poor 132 APPENDIX C Parent Behaviors Device Labeling / Vocabulary Development Assists child in developing new use of vocabulary words. Says or provides a label for (1) an object, (2) a person, (3) a place, (4) a qualifier, or (5) an action word. Asks a why, what, where, or how question. Says or provides a word or phrase close in meaning to another word already used. Verbal Expression (parent) Models verbal fluency. Expands upon child's utterance, providing a more complete sentence structure. Validates child's utterance by repeating the child's word or saying "yes,," "oh,," or "uh huh." Comments on the story as she reads. Prior Knowledge Questions or comments so as to encourage child to recall a previous experience or prior knowledge. Encourages child to make judgments about the story (based on prior knowledge). Helps child to recall a previous experience related to the story. Book Structure Assists child in developing awareness of the book's physical organization or story narrative. Calls attention to parts of the book such as author, illustrator, and cover pages. Identifies cause and effect relations or chains of events that relate to the main narrative. Leads a summary of story events. (Tangential or merely descriptive comments should be ruled out.) Encourages child's retelling of parts of the story.
Abstract As technology access and use increases in early childhood classrooms and at home, there ... more Abstract As technology access and use increases in early childhood classrooms and at home, there is an increased need to support students’ understanding of how to be safe, responsible, and cooperative digital media users. While teaching media literacy in education has some historical context, it is only relatively recently that school districts have expanded their efforts to teach other digital citizenship competencies, including internet safety, media balance, and digital footprint. The purpose of this paper is to use survey data of teachers to document how the teaching of digital citizenship competencies in elementary school varies based on factors such as demographics of the students and the amount of educator experience. Results from this descriptive study indicate that elementary educators are teaching digital citizenship as early as Kindergarten but not all competencies of digital citizenship are being taught equally. Additionally, early teaching of digital citizenship competencies is more likely to occur in suburban schools and schools with more racially-ethnically diverse students. These results have implications for education policies around supporting digital citizenship competencies starting early in formal schooling.
Experts have expressed concerns about the lack of evidence demonstrating that children's "educati... more Experts have expressed concerns about the lack of evidence demonstrating that children's "educational" applications (apps) have educational value. This study aimed to operationalize Hirsh-Pasek, Zosh, and colleagues' Four Pillars of Learning into a reliable coding scheme (Pillar 1: Active Learning, Pillar 2: Engagement in the Learning Process, Pillar 3: Meaningful Learning, Pillar 4: Social Interaction), describe the educational quality of commercially available apps, and examine differences in educational quality between free and paid apps. We analyzed 100 children's educational apps with the highest downloads from Google Play and Apple app stores, as well as 24 apps most frequently played by preschoolage children in a longitudinal cohort study. We developed a coding scheme in which each app earned a value of 0-3 for each Pillar, defining lower-quality apps as those scoring ≤4, summed across the Four Pillars. Overall scores were low across all Pillars. Free apps had significantly lower Pillar 2 (Engagement in Learning Process) scores (t-test, p < .0001) and overall scores (t-test, p < .0047) when compared to paid apps, due to the presence of distracting enhancements. These results highlight the need for improved design of educational apps guided by developmental science.
Television has become a nearly ubiquitous feature in children's cultural landscape. A review of t... more Television has become a nearly ubiquitous feature in children's cultural landscape. A review of the research into young children's learning from television indicates that the likelihood that children will learn from screen media is influenced by their developing social relationships with on-screen characters, as much as by their developing perception of the screen and their symbolic understanding and comprehension of information presented on screen. Considering the circumstances in which children under 6 years learn from screen media can inform teachers, parents, and researchers about the important nature of social interaction in early learning and development. The findings reviewed in this article suggest the social nature of learning, even learning from screen media.
To examine whether children between 12 and 25 months of age learn words from an infantdirected DV... more To examine whether children between 12 and 25 months of age learn words from an infantdirected DVD designed for that purpose. Design: Half of the children received a DVD to watch in their home over the course of 6 weeks. Setting: All participants returned to a laboratory for testing on vocabulary acquisition every 2 weeks. Participants: Ninety-six 12-to 24-month-old children. Main Exposure: Baby videos. Main Outcome Measures: Parent report and observational measures of vocabulary acquisition related to words highlighted in the DVD; parent report of general language development; and parent report of children's media use. Results: The age at first viewing of baby DVDs was related to children's general language development. There was no evidence of learning words highlighted in the infantdirected DVD independent of parental intervention. Conclusions: Researchers should continue to examine whether infant-directed media are effective in teaching infants and toddlers content and consider the cognitive factors related to whether very young viewers should be expected to learn from a DVD.
The Handbook of Children, Media, and Development, 2008
... Using children&amp;#x27;s self-reports via a similar diary method to that used by Lundber... more ... Using children&amp;#x27;s self-reports via a similar diary method to that used by Lundberg and his colleagues, Timmer, Eccles, and O&amp;#x27;Brien found ... As early as 1929, Walt Disney instituted a series of promotional activities to attract children to his movies; he instituted Mickey Mouse Clubs ...
Psychological science in the public interest : a journal of the American Psychological Society, 2015
Children are in the midst of a vast, unplanned experiment, surrounded by digital technologies tha... more Children are in the midst of a vast, unplanned experiment, surrounded by digital technologies that were not available but 5 years ago. At the apex of this boom is the introduction of applications ("apps") for tablets and smartphones. However, there is simply not the time, money, or resources available to evaluate each app as it enters the market. Thus, "educational" apps-the number of which, as of January 2015, stood at 80,000 in Apple's App Store (Apple, 2015)-are largely unregulated and untested. This article offers a way to define the potential educational impact of current and future apps. We build upon decades of work on the Science of Learning, which has examined how children learn best. From this work, we abstract a set of principles for two ultimate goals. First, we aim to guide researchers, educators, and designers in evidence-based app development. Second, by creating an evidence-based guide, we hope to set a new standard for evaluating and selectin...
... label, describe, and ask questions (Barr, Zack, Garcia, &amp; Muentener, 2008; DeLoache &... more ... label, describe, and ask questions (Barr, Zack, Garcia, &amp; Muentener, 2008; DeLoache &amp; DeMendoza, 1987; Fidler, Zack, and Barr, 2010; Namy, Acredolo, &amp; ... In contrast to a book reading interaction, in which the parent and/or child can set the pace of the interaction, the DVD ...
This study examined the relationship between viewing an infant DVD and expressive and receptive l... more This study examined the relationship between viewing an infant DVD and expressive and receptive language outcomes. Children between 12 and 15 months were randomly assigned to view Baby Wordsworth, a DVD highlighting words around the house marketed for children beginning at 12 months of age. Viewings took place in home settings over 6 weeks. After every 2 weeks and five exposures to the DVD, children were assessed on expressive and receptive communication measures. Results indicated there was no increased growth on either outcome for children who had viewed the DVD as compared to children in the control group, even after multiple exposures. After controlling for age, gender, cognitive developmental level, income, and parent education, the most significant predictor of vocabulary comprehension and production scores was the amount of time children were read to.
Baby media have exploded in the past decade, and children younger than 2 are showing increased us... more Baby media have exploded in the past decade, and children younger than 2 are showing increased use of these baby media. This paper examines the historical evidence of babies' use of television since the 1950s as well as the various factors that have given rise to the current increase in screen media for babies. We also consider the ubiquitous role of television in American families, the impact of evidence regarding the educational benefits of educational television on preschoolers, and positive parental beliefs about the usefulness of such educational media in preparing young children for schooling. Finally, we examine the theoretical issues of importance for guiding research into the interactions between media exposure and cognitive development, including the role of media in changing the context of children's development and constraints on the kinds of things babies can learn from screen media. Lastly, we suggest that screen media may indeed be changing the nature of children's development.
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