Morag MacLean

Nursery rhymes, phonological skills and reading.

Nursery rhymes are an almost universal part of young English-speaking childrens lives. We have already established that there are strong links between childrens early knowledge of nursery rhymes at 3;3 and their developing phonological skills over the next year and a quarter. Since such skills are known to be related to childrens success in learning to read, this result suggests the hypothesis that acquaintance with nursery rhymes might also affect childrens reading. We now report longitudinal data from a group of 64 children from the age of 3;4 to 6;3 which support this hypothesis. There is a strong relation between early knowledge of nursery rhymes and success in reading and spelling over the next three years even after differences in social background, I.Q and the childrens phonological skills at the start of the project are taken into account. This raises the question of how nursery rhymes have such an effect. Our answer is that knowledge of nursery rhymes enhances childrens phonological sensitivity which in turn helps them to learn to read. This paper presents further analyses which support the idea of this path from nursery rhymes to reading. Nursery rhymes are related to the childs subsequent sensitivity to rhyme and phonemes. Moreover the connection between knowledge of nursery rhymes and reading and spelling ability disappears when controls are made for differences in these subsequent phonological skills.

Rhyme, language, and children's reading

It has been shown that there is a strong relation between childrens phonological skills and the progress that they make in reading. But there is some uncertainty whether this is a specific connection or whether it is just a byproduct of variations in general language ability. We report evidence from a longitudinal study showing that the relation between childrens sensitivity to rhyme and alliteration and their success in reading is highly specific and cannot be accounted for in terms of general language ability. In this study measures were taken of a group of childrens linguistic and metalinguistic skills when they were 3 and 4 years old. The linguistic measures were of the childrens vocabulary, their receptive and expressive use of grammar, and their ability to imitate sentences. The metalinguistic measures were of their ability to detect rhyme and alliteration and of their awareness of syntax. Two to three years later, when the children were 6;7, we measured their progress in reading and spelling. The childrens rhyme and alliteration scores were related to their reading two years later even after controls for differences in linguistic skills and also for differences in intelligence and in social background. The other metalinguistic task - syntax awareness - did not predict reading after these controls. Awareness of rhyme, we argue, makes a distinctive contribution to reading by helping children to form spelling categories.

Children's journey to school : Spatial skills, knowledge and perceptions of the environment

The growth in accompanied travel to school, particularly by car, has led to speculation about the cognitive and emotional impact of this change on child development. Spatial skills, knowledge of the environment, and perceptions of the environment were assessed in 93 children aged between 7 and 12 years. Children who were accompanied to school performed as well as their unaccompanied peers on spatial ability tests and showed no greater concern with stranger danger. However, they showed a greater tendency to cite traffic danger in their responses, and a greater knowledge of the environment as indicated by the use of landmarks in their drawings of their locality. Children who had more freedom to travel without adults on nonschool journeys also showed a greater use of landmarks. Mode of transport had no effect on the studys measures. These results are discussed with reference to the nature of the journey to school and to other places.

Parental attitudes to children's journeys to school

The growth in accompanied travel to school has been one of the most pronounced changes in travel behaviour over the last 20 years. Hillman et al. (1990) have noted how the proportion of seven-eight year old children who travel independently to school in England has declined from 80 per cent in 1971 to 9 per cent in 1990. A full understanding of parental views on the journey to school is required if policy makers wish to encourage parents to behave differently. The implication of Hillman et al.s finding is that, since traffic danger is of prime significance to parents, improvements in traffic calming, safe routes to school etc. would result in a decrease in parental accompaniment. However, if parental reasoning is more multifaceted than Hillman et al.s data acknow- ledges, a single policy measure focusing only on traffic is unlikely to affect parental behaviour. The current study aimed to discover more about parental preferences and how these influence childrens travel behaviour. KW: SR2S

Maternal Expectations of Child Development in India, Japan, and England

Maternal expectations of child development were compared in India, Japan, and England. Fifty mothers from both India and Japan, and 70 mothers from England were asked to indicate the age at which they expected a child to achieve competence in 45 tasks, reflecting education/self-care, compliance, peer interaction, communication, emotional control, and environmental independence competencies. On average, competence was expected at a slightly earlier age in Japan than in England, and altogether later in India. However, differences between cultures were domain specific. Japanese expectations only exceeded English expectations in the education/self-care and environmental independence domains. Indian expectations were significantly later than Japanese and English expectations in all domains except environmental independence, where they were later than Japanese but earlier than English expectations.

Aprendendo a ler e a escrever: a narrativa das crianças sobre a alfabetização

Esse estudo examina as narrativas orais feitas por criancas da primeira serie escolar acerca da alfabetizacao. Foram entrevistadas 38 criancas vindas de familias de baixa renda e que frequentavam uma escola publica da cidade do Rio de Janeiro. A maioria das criancas que encontraram dificuldade durante o processo de alfabetizacao produziu narrativas que se referiam a descricao da rotina escolar ou de atividade relacionada a leitura e a escrita sem mencao ao desempenho do protagonista da historia. Por outro lado, as criancas que foram bem-sucedidas produziram um numero significativo de historias relatando o sucesso do protagonista durante o aprendizado inicial da leitura e da escrita. Poucas historias foram produzidas, por ambos os grupos, narrando o insucesso do protagonista. Os resultados foram discutidos com relacao as representacoes acerca da experiencia de sucesso ou fracasso experimentado pela crianca em seu aprendizado.

Maternal mind-mindedness: stability over time and consistency across relationships

Abstract Maternal mind-mindedness has been described both as a cognitive-behavioural trait and as a relational construct. This study assessed stability over time and consistency across relationships of maternal mind-mindedness in relation to preschool and primary school siblings and compared representational and interactional mind-mindedness. Mothers with two children between 2½ and 10 years were assessed twice, nine months apart (N = 32 at Time 1; N = 30 at Time 2). Representational mind-mindedness for a partner/friend was also assessed twice. Mothers’ representational mind-mindedness showed temporal stability but was inconsistent across relationships with two children and a partner/friend. Conversely, mothers’ interactional mind-mindedness was stable and highly consistent across relationships with two children. This supports the possibility that mothers’ interactional mind-mindedness is trait-like, while findings are equivocal for representational mind-mindedness. Representational mind-mindedness and interactional mind-mindedness were unrelated in this preliminary study, suggesting that these measures of maternal mind-mindedness were not equivalent for this age group.

Accident frequency and unrealistic optimism: children's assessment of risk

Accidental injury is a major cause of mortality and morbidity among children, warranting research on their risk perceptions. Three hundred and seven children aged 10-11 years assessed the frequency, danger and personal risk likelihood of 8 accidents. Two social-cognitive biases were manifested. The frequency of rare accidents (e.g. drowning) was overestimated, and the frequency of common accidents (e.g. bike accidents) underestimated; and the majority of children showed unrealistic optimism tending to see themselves as less likely to suffer these accidents in comparison to their peers, offering superior skills or parental control of the environment as an explanation. In the case of pedestrian accidents, children recognised their seriousness, underestimated the frequency of this risk and regarded their own road crossing skill as protection. These findings highlight the challenging task facing safety educators who, when teaching conventional safety knowledge and routines, also need to alert children to the danger of over-confidence without disabling them though fear.