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Category: Project

Description: We compared word learning of bilingual five-year-olds from two types of bilingual storybook materials: typical single-language books (i.e., two copies of the same book, each in a different language), and bilingual books (i.e. one copy of the book, with text in both languages on each page). Children were successful at learning words in both languages, regardless of book format and language proficiency. Children neither favored nor avoided learning translation equivalents. These results suggest that children are flexible word learners and that shared bilingual book reading — regardless of book format — is an effective way to teach bilingual children new words in two languages.