Enhancing achievement in mathematics involves overcoming barriers regarding discontinuity between school and other life contexts, motivational and other affective aspects, and language factors. The utility of cross-age peer tutoring using mathematical games and scaffolding of mathematical discourse in overcoming these barriers is explored in a study of prepost impact for both tutors and tutees. Participants were all the seven-year-old (n = 13) and 11-year-old (n = 14) pupils in a small, rural primary school. After matching and training of pairs, the project ran for five weeks, with two sessions of 30 minutes each week. Pre-and post-intervention, tutors completed the Me-As-Learner Scale (MALS), class teachers completed the Behavioural Indicators of Self-esteem (BIOS) scale with respect to both tutors and tutees, and tutors and tutees completed questionnaires on feelings and attitudes to mathematics. Verbal interaction in a sample of pairs was recorded pre-and post-intervention and analysed. Tutors participated in group subjective feedback discussions at midand post-intervention. Class teachers gave post hoc subjective evaluations. Tutors gained significantly overall on MALS and BIOS. Tutees gained significantly overall on BIOS. The tutor overall questionnaire gain was not significant, but the tutee gain was. Verbal interactions showed marked and significant increases in use of mathematical words, strategic dialogue and praise between partners, with a corresponding decline in procedural talk. Other qualitative improvements in interactions were evident, and subjective feedback from tutors and teachers was largely positive. This brief project appeared largely successful in increasing self-esteem for both tutors and tutees, and in increasing both the quantity and quality of interactive discussion about mathematics between children, as well as generic social and communication behaviours in the tutors.Questions remain about the longer-term duration of these gains, especially in different contexts. Recommendations for future research and practice are made.

Despite poor vocabulary outcomes for children with hearing loss, few studies have evaluated the effectiveness of specific vocabulary teaching methods on vocabulary learning for this group. The authors compared three vocabulary instruction conditions with preschool children with hearing loss: (a) explicit, direct instruction; (b) follow-in labeling; and (c) incidental exposure using an adapted alternating-treatments single-subject experimental design. Nine preschool children with hearing loss participated in the study across 6 weeks, with intervention implemented by 4 teachers of the deaf. Visual analysis of the results of the data indicated that participants learned the most words in the explicit, direct instruction condition and the fewest words in the incidental exposure condition. These results are not consistent with some recommendations currently made to educators. The authors discuss implications for practice, including emphasis on direct instruction.

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Purpose The purpose of this article was to examine evidence that (a) published measures may tap different categories of print knowledge and result in disparate findings in the literature, (b) concept vocabulary knowledge in children with hearing loss may exacerbate deficits in conceptual print knowledge, and (c) concept vocabulary can be taught via direct instruction for preschool children with hearing loss. Method In Study 1, an item analysis of published print knowledge measures was performed to determine the prevalence of concept vocabulary in test items. Additionally, the performance on a conceptual print knowledge measure was compared for preschool children with and without hearing loss. In Study 2, four preschool children participated in a multiple probe across behaviors treatment design to determine if concept vocabulary could be explicitly taught to children with hearing loss. Results Differences emerged in use of concept vocabulary on test items across the measures, which may explain disparate findings that have been reported in this area. Additionally, children with hearing loss performed lower than children with typical hearing on items that contained concept vocabulary but not on items that did not. Finally, we found initial evidence that direct instruction can improve concept vocabulary for children with hearing loss, and it might not be necessary to separately target each concept category. Conclusion This series of studies lays groundwork for future research confirming a connection between conceptual print knowledge and conceptual vocabulary knowledge, and offers evidence for intervention that could be used clinically to teach conceptual vocabulary.