The impact of scaffolding and overhearing on young children's use of the spatial termsbetweenandmiddle

Abstract

ABSTRACTThe primary goal was to specify the impact of scaffolding and overhearing on young children's use of the spatial termsbetweenandmiddle. Four- and five-year-old children described the location of a mouse hidden between two furniture items in a dollhouse with assistance from a parent. Children's use ofbetweenandmiddleincreased significantly across trials, and in concert, parents' directive scaffolding involvingmiddledecreased across trials. In the second study, three common scaffolding types (Between Directive, Middle Directive, non-directive) were compared with a no prompt condition by having children receive prompts from a doll and with overhearing conditions in which children overheard conversations between two adult experimenters containingbetweenormiddle. Children's use ofbetweenandmiddlewas much more frequent following directive prompting than following non-directive prompting, no prompting, or overhearing. Moreover, children showed some evidence of usingbetweenandmiddlein response to non-directive prompting and overhearing.