It’s been a busy year of growth and development in 2019… not just for the kiddos that we’re studying but for the Read Lab too 🙂 Here are some highlights:

• In 2019 seven fabulous student researchers graduated (#scuproud) and eight new researchers have joined our team. The students in the Read Lab power all of our work and are the friendly faces that the kids interact with, the creative juice behind our kid-friendly stories and games, and the dedicated assistants who code, transcribe, edit and read.. read.. read.. the background literature every week. Our team is our research family and in 2019 it was a big family indeed!
• In 2019 we shared our hottest findings and works in progress at three international conferences – the Jean Piaget Society meeting in Portland, Oregon, the Child Language Forum in Sheffield, England and most recently the Cognitive Development Society meeting in Louisville, Kentucky. These meetings help connect the work we do here at Santa Clara with other labs and researchers far and wide, keep us up to speed on what other researchers are up to in the world of early language learning, and give us a chance to gather great ideas and feedback on the best new ways to ask and answer questions about what and how to enrich the language development of the kids we work with!
• In 2019 our newest favorite paper on how dramatic pausing in read alouds helps children pick up new vocabulary from storybooks came out in the peer reviewed journal First Language (check it out here!) and we’re super proud of it.
• In 2019 with the support our local family volunteers and partner preschools we wrapped up four different studies with the participation of over 150 children and their caregivers! Stay tuned in 2020 as we analyze all this data and can share more findings about how children can (or sometimes can’t) use rhyme to help them learn, the types of bilingual storybooks that can help children grow their second language vocabularies, and what children learn from hearing their own names in books about sharing – hint: it may not be how to be better at sharing 🙂
• And, finally, in 2019 we started planning three new (funny, bilingual, science-y) projects that you’ll be hearing much more about in 2020!

And, now a holiday break before the next year of reading, adventure, and language learning kicks off…