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1. Low Spatial Proximity Between Text and Illustrations Improves Children’s Comprehension and Attention: An Eye Tracking Study.

   Boyd, M; Godwin, K.E.; Gurchiek, E.; Fisher, A.V.; Eng, C.M. (July 2022, Proceedings of the Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society)

   Culbertson, J.; Perfors, A; Rabagliati, H.; Ramenzoni, V. (Ed.)

   Learning to read is a critical skill; yet only a small portion of children in the United States are reading at or above grade level. Attention is one crucial process that affects the acquisition of reading skills. The process involves selectively choosing task relevant information and requires monitoring competing demands. Many books for beginning readers include illustrations, but this design choice may require learners to split their attention between multiple sources of information. This study employed eye tracking to examine whether embedding text within illustrations in children’s e-books inadvertently induces attentional competition. The results showed that spatially separating illustrations from the text in beginning reader books reduces attentional competition and improves children’s reading comprehension. This study shows that changes to the design of books for beginning readers can help promote literacy development in children. 

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2. Deal Me in: Playing Cards in the Home to Learn Math

   https://doi.org/10.3390/educsci12030190  

   Scalise, Nicole R.; DePascale, Mary; Tavassolie, Nadia; McCown, Claire; Ramani, Geetha B. (March 2022, Education Sciences)

   Recent meta-analyses have demonstrated a significant association between children’s early math achievement and their experiences with math at home, including their caregivers’ talk about math. However, few studies have investigated the relations between caregiver math talk and children’s learning with experimental designs. Eighty-six children (M = 5.0 years) and their caregivers were randomly assigned to play either a numeracy or a shape card game at home for six weeks. Data were collected on children’s number and shape knowledge and families’ math talk during gameplay. There was substantial participant attrition (42% did not return completed materials), however, both an intent-to-treat analysis of the sample that received study materials and a subgroup analysis of study completers showed that children who played the shape game significantly improved their shape naming and matching skills relative to children who played the number game. Children who played the number game did not significantly improve their numerical skills relative to children who played the shape game. Mathematical talk during gameplay varied between families but was correlated over time within families. Caregivers’ and children’s talk about matching cards by shape or color predicted children’s learning from the shape game. The results suggest that despite receiving uniform instructions and materials, there was significant variability in children’s home math experiences that predicted their learning from the card game. 

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3. corpus and behavioral analysis of the quality of young children’s STEM books.

   Miller, H.E. (January 2020, Proceedings of the 42nd Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society)

   Promoting early STEM knowledge helps to prepare children for formal schooling. Shared book reading may promote early STEM knowledge. This research examined the quality of available STEM books in children’s environments and investigated how such books influenced children’s learning in shared book reading contexts. In Study 1, we used both meaning-based human coding and computerized latent semantic analysis to categorize books based on the extent to which they provided support for encoding and demand for active recall. We found similarity in the ratings using the two approaches. Most books fell into categories characterized by low Support and Demand. In Study 2, we found that 4- to 5-year-olds learned more STEM facts when books were high in Support and/or Demand, although few books fell into those categories. This research highlights the importance that textual features of books play in promoting early STEM knowledge during shared book reading. 

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4. What might books be teaching young children about gender?

   https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/ntgfe  

   Lewis, M.; Borkenhagen, M.C.; Converse, E.; Lupyan, G.; Seidenberg, M.S. (January 2022, Psychological science)

   We investigated how gender is represented in children’s books using a novel 200,000 word corpus comprising 247 popular, contemporary books for young children. Using human judgments and word co-occurrence data, we quantified gender biases of words in individual books and in the whole corpus. We find that children’s books contain many words that adults judge as gendered. Semantic analyses based on co-occurrence data yielded word clusters related to gender stereotypes (e.g., feminine: emotions; masculine: tools). Co-occurrence data also indicate that many books instantiate gender stereotypes identified in other research (e.g., girls are better at reading and boys at math). Finally, we used large-scale data to estimate the gender distribution of the audience for individual books, and find that children are more often exposed to gender stereotypes for their own gender. Together the data suggest that children’s books may be an early source of gender associations and stereotypes. 

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5. Early Sources of Children’s Math Achievement in Chile: The Role of Parental Beliefs and Feelings about Math

   https://doi.org/10.1080/10409289.2020.1799617  

   del Río, M. Francisca; Susperreguy, María Inés; Strasser, Katherine; Cvencek, Dario; Iturra, Carolina; Gallardo, Ismael; Meltzoff, Andrew N. (January 2020, Early Education and Development)

   Research Findings: Two hundred and sixty-seven Chilean children from grades 1–3, their fathers and their mothers completed measures of implicit and explicit math-related beliefs (math–gender stereotypes, math selfconcepts) and feelings (math anxiety), as well as tests of mathematical achievement. Children, fathers, and mothers exhibited stereotypes that link math with males. More specifically, mothers identified more with language than with math, while fathers and children identified more with math than with language. Path analyses models revealed that children’s explicit math self-concepts significantly predicted their actual math achievement. Children’s explicit self-concept was, in turn, explained marginally by the mathematical anxiety of their mothers. Practice or Policy: These results contribute to our understanding of the relation between parental and children’s beliefs and children’s math achievement during early elementary school years. In countries such as Chile, with a significant gender gap in math achievement, these findings may highlight relevant aspects to consider when designing interventions aimed at educational equity and providing equal mathematical learning opportunities to boys and girls. 

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