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Chapter 10 - One Career, Two Career Narratives

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 February 2025

By
Catherine E. Snow
Edited by
Frank Kessel
Frank Kessel
Affiliation:
University of New Mexico
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Summary

My work has been primarily located in two fields, both characterized by heated disagreements when I entered them. In child language research the nativist view was the default position in the late 1960s and through the next couple of decades. But in 1967 I studied adult input to children, in service of understanding its contributions to language acquisition. By the 2020s the notion that certain features of adult-child interaction are instrumental in language development has been robustly supported by multiple lines of work. I first got involved in thinking about literacy development in the mid-1990s during a time of conflict between what was then framed as “phonics” versus “whole language.” That conflict resurfaces with depressing regularity and is currently characterized as a struggle to implement the “science of reading.” The complexities in the reading domain are far greater than in language acquisition because of the larger role of educational publishers and school administrators in determining a course of action.

Keywords

language developmentnativismsocial interactionphonicsmeaningreading instruction
Type
Chapter
Information
Pillars of Developmental Psychology
Recollections and Reflections
 , pp. 100 - 111
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2025

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References

Suggested Reading

Anderson, H., Graham, S., Prime, H., Jenkins, J., & Madigan, S. (2021). Linking quality and quantity of parental linguistic input to child language skills: A meta-analysis. Child Development, 92(2), 484–501. https://doi.org/10.1111/cdev.13508.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Donovan, M. S., Snow, C. E., & Huyghe, A. (2021). Differentiating research-practice partnerships: Affordances, constraints, criteria, and strategies for achieving success. Studies in Educational Evaluation, 71 (December), 101083. https://doi.org.10.1016/j.stueduc.2021.101083.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kim, Y-S. & Snow, C. (2021). The “science of reading” is incomplete without the “science of teaching reading.” The Reading League Journal, 2(3), 5–8, 10–13.Google Scholar
Snow, C. E. (1987). Relevance of the notion of a critical period to language acquisition. In Bornstein, M. H. (Ed.), Sensitive Periods in Development (pp. 183–209). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.Google Scholar
Snow, C. E., Burns, S. & Griffin, P. (Eds.). (1998). Preventing Reading Difficulties in Young Children. Washington, DC: National Academy Press.Google Scholar
Snow, C. & Matthews, T. (2016). Reading and language in the early grades. Starting Early: Education from Prekindergarten to Third Grade. Future of Children, 26(2), 57–74. https://futureofchildren.princeton.edu/sites/g/files/toruqf2411/files/resource-links/starting_early_26_2_full_journal.pdf.Google Scholar

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