Chapter 4. Does emotional narrative context influence retention of newly learned words?
-
Katharina Rohlfing
Abstract
In this pilot study, we hypothesized that emotional information in stories allows children to become involved in the verbal interaction. This involvement, in turn, might result in improving children’s ability to learn new words. To test this hypothesis, 20 German-speaking 2-year-old children listened to stories containing the spatial prepositions behind [hinter] and next to [neben]. These words were presented within ‘emotional stories’ to the experimental group (N = 10) and within ‘neutral stories’ to the control group (N = 10). The ‘emotional stories’ comprised adjectives (happy, excited), affective markers in the form of direct speech (look here!, shouting out loud: “I’m coming”), connotations (spring, friend, favorite dish), and evocative physical descriptions (the wind is whistling) to enhance the emotional content of the stories in the experimental group. Results show that children trained with the ‘emotional’ stories retained the learned target prepositions as well as children trained with the ‘neutral’ stories. In a delayed post-test, retention of the newly learned words improved over time for all children. This study presents a first approach to investigating the role of emotion in young children’s word learning in the context of picture bookreading. The results are discussed with respect to the methods and materials used.
Abstract
In this pilot study, we hypothesized that emotional information in stories allows children to become involved in the verbal interaction. This involvement, in turn, might result in improving children’s ability to learn new words. To test this hypothesis, 20 German-speaking 2-year-old children listened to stories containing the spatial prepositions behind [hinter] and next to [neben]. These words were presented within ‘emotional stories’ to the experimental group (N = 10) and within ‘neutral stories’ to the control group (N = 10). The ‘emotional stories’ comprised adjectives (happy, excited), affective markers in the form of direct speech (look here!, shouting out loud: “I’m coming”), connotations (spring, friend, favorite dish), and evocative physical descriptions (the wind is whistling) to enhance the emotional content of the stories in the experimental group. Results show that children trained with the ‘emotional’ stories retained the learned target prepositions as well as children trained with the ‘neutral’ stories. In a delayed post-test, retention of the newly learned words improved over time for all children. This study presents a first approach to investigating the role of emotion in young children’s word learning in the context of picture bookreading. The results are discussed with respect to the methods and materials used.
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Acknowledgements ix
- List of contributors xi
- About the authors xv
- Introduction to narrative, literacy and other skills 1
-
Part I. The importance of oral narratives for literacy, language and socio-cognitive skills
- Chapter 1. The developing language foundation for reading comprehension 21
- Chapter 2. Storybooks to promote emergent literacy in kindergarten classrooms 43
- Chapter 3. Do children’s oral retellings of narrative and informational texts predict scores on a standardized reading comprehension test? 69
- Chapter 4. Does emotional narrative context influence retention of newly learned words? 91
- Chapter 5. Enhancing mental state language and emotion understanding of toddlers’ social cognition 109
- Chapter 6. The effects of bookreading with and without mental state themes on preschoolers’ theory of mind 129
- Chapter 7. Using narrative thinking in argumentative writing 151
-
Part II. Promoting narrative skills
- Chapter 8. New frontiers in facilitating narrative skills in children and adolescents 173
- Chapter 9. Precursors of narrative abilities 201
- Chapter 10. Enriching parent-child discourse during book sharing 223
- Chapter 11. Investigating the effectiveness of the Our Story App to increase children’s narrative skills 245
- Chapter 12. Using a storytelling/story-acting practice to promote narrative and other decontextualized language skills in disadvantaged children 263
- Chapter 13. Promoting narratives through a short conversational intervention in typically-developing and high-functioning children with ASD 285
- Subject index 313
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Acknowledgements ix
- List of contributors xi
- About the authors xv
- Introduction to narrative, literacy and other skills 1
-
Part I. The importance of oral narratives for literacy, language and socio-cognitive skills
- Chapter 1. The developing language foundation for reading comprehension 21
- Chapter 2. Storybooks to promote emergent literacy in kindergarten classrooms 43
- Chapter 3. Do children’s oral retellings of narrative and informational texts predict scores on a standardized reading comprehension test? 69
- Chapter 4. Does emotional narrative context influence retention of newly learned words? 91
- Chapter 5. Enhancing mental state language and emotion understanding of toddlers’ social cognition 109
- Chapter 6. The effects of bookreading with and without mental state themes on preschoolers’ theory of mind 129
- Chapter 7. Using narrative thinking in argumentative writing 151
-
Part II. Promoting narrative skills
- Chapter 8. New frontiers in facilitating narrative skills in children and adolescents 173
- Chapter 9. Precursors of narrative abilities 201
- Chapter 10. Enriching parent-child discourse during book sharing 223
- Chapter 11. Investigating the effectiveness of the Our Story App to increase children’s narrative skills 245
- Chapter 12. Using a storytelling/story-acting practice to promote narrative and other decontextualized language skills in disadvantaged children 263
- Chapter 13. Promoting narratives through a short conversational intervention in typically-developing and high-functioning children with ASD 285
- Subject index 313
