Children in New Zealand’s socio-economically advantaged communities generally start school with a working vocabulary of 6,000 or more words in English, while children from low socio-economic areas start school with a vocabulary of fewer than 3,000 words. A recent study by Jannie van Hees, Cognition research scholar and specialist in linguistics and pedagogy at the University of Auckland’s Faculty of Education, shows teachers how to improve school entrants’ patterns of interaction and oral expression in the classroom. The result is a complete turn around in students’ expression and engagement in learning.
Read more here: This article, written by Kate Backler - Faculty Writer and Communications, Faculty of Education, The University of Auckland, was originally published in Te Kuaka magazine (Issue Three, 2011).)
Read Jannie’s earlier work on this same topic. Click here
