The role of teachers' metacognitive talk in young children's language development: a pilot study

Introduction. Child-directed speech plays a fundamental role in language development and learning (Weiss et al., 2022). Research in metacognition has demonstrated that input structured around metacognitive strategies facilitates learning, particularly in fields such as mathematics and reading comprehension (Grammer et al., 2016 ; Urban et al., 2023). However, the relationship between the metacognitive characteristics of teachers' talk and language development remains unexplored.
Methods. This pilot study will analyse the metacognitive talk of preschool teachers and examine its influence on children's language development over one year. The study will involve five teachers and 26 French-speaking preschool children. Teacher-child interactions will be recorded two times: once in the middle and at the end of the year, encompassing three activities (language, mathematics, and informal interactions). The metacognitive talk will be categorised into two types: (1) monitoring occurrences (feedback, metacognitive judgments, e.g.: “exact, you said it very well”) and (2) control occurrences (statements, questions about strategies used, e.g.: “we repeat the words we've learned to remember them for next time”). Non-metacognitive talk will also be coded for comparison. The assessment of language skills will encompass vocabulary, phonological awareness and inferences.
Expected results. Descriptive analyses and correlation analyses will identify the input characteristics most predictive of language development.
Discussion. This study aims to enhance language support practices by providing an innovative theoretical framework for understanding the role of metacognitive talk in improving the quality of language input and its impact on the development of young children's language skills.