Conversation matters. During lockdown, we’ve all felt the frustration of only ever being able to talk to others through a screen. Especially for younger children, we know that the serve and return of everyday conversation with adults is vital for their ability to communicate, and their social and emotional development.

Although it is too early to say what the impact of the past year will be, there is already growing concern about the effect on children’s oral language.

Teachers, especially those in early years and key stage 1, have anecdotally shared their concerns about children’s expressive and receptive language. The interim findings of the School Starters study, run by Claudine Bowyer-Crane, Sara Bonetti and Louise Tracy, support that anecdotal data. And Catherine Davies and colleagues have begun to show that preschoolers’ language acquisition has been negatively affected during the lockdown period.

However, a new study by Nicky Dawson and colleagues at University of Oxford offers some insights into the language that children hear day to day. The researchers looked at the differences in caregiver speech directed at children in everyday conversation and the language in books designed to be read to children from birth to the age of 5.

The study found that language in books is different from spoken language, which typically takes place in the “here and now”, and is supported by gestures, tone, pitch and facial expressions. Children are immersed in spoken language, which helps them learn more about the world while also learning language itself.

In contrast, when the researchers explored the language in 160 books typically read to children, they found that book language is denser, more diverse and comprises a larger proportion of rarer word types, compared with child-directed speech. The researchers found that book words are more abstract, meaning that they refer to concepts that go beyond direct sensory experiences (for example, words such as “truth” ). Books also contain more nouns and adjectives than child-directed speech, which typically uses more pronouns.

So, what does this mean for those of us working in schools? One of the obvious implications is that if we wish to expose children to a wider variety of rich language, increasing the time we spend reading to children is an easy and enjoyable way to do this. Reading the same books over and over has also been shown to have a positive impact on helping children to learn new language.

Wider exposure to adjectives through book reading may also support the development of children’s understanding of the world. Adjectives such as “big”, “little”, “heavy”, “light”, “large” and “small” all describe concepts and relative values. A big rat is somewhat different in size to a big building (Davies, et al, 2020). Repeatedly coming across these words within text can help to develop children’s understanding of conceptual nuances in language - something that is important for maths, as well as language and literacy.

This shows us that interventions don’t need to come in a shiny package. Of course, the next question we need to answer is how to share books with pupils as effectively as possible. But if we are looking for a simple, evidence-informed strategy to support young children now, then reading more books might be a great place to start.

Megan Dixon is director of research at Holy Catholic Family Multi-Academy Trust

This article originally appeared in the 16 April 2021 issue under the headline “It’s good to talk, but even better to read”