Study title

Data are archived for three studies. The longitudinal study tracked oral vocabulary and reading development in across late childhood and early adolescence, from ages 12 to 14 years. Experiment 1 investigated whether the presence of orthography facilitates oral vocabulary acquisition. Experiment 2 investigated how we can promote incidental word learning through the process of reading.Learning to read and acquiring a large and rich vocabulary have important implications for education and other aspects of daily life. Secondary education policy emphasises spoken and written communication. However, against a backdrop of calls for policy to focus on post-primary literacy (All-Party Parliamentary Group for Education, 2011 literacy inquiry) and recent concerns over GCSE English grades, there is a clear need to prioritise reading and oral vocabulary in secondary schools. Oral vocabulary skills underpin successful reading to the extent that a reader must understand the words in a text in order to fully understand it. Equally though, the reading process provides opportunities for new words to be learned. Therefore, growth in oral vocabulary should promote reading development and vice versa. Existing research has focused on the relationship between reading and oral vocabulary in childhood, neglecting its importance in adolescence. Motivation for extending our understanding of oral vocabulary and reading to adolescence comes from evidence that as pupils get older and word reading becomes more automatic, oral vocabulary plays an increasingly important role in reading success. In addition, reading may be a particularly important strategy for vocabulary acquisition in secondary school, where pedagogical approaches emphasise independent reading and it is likely that unfamiliar words (e.g., science terms) are encountered in texts daily. Finally, fostering reading and vocabulary is essential for learning across the curriculum and this presents a particular challenge for secondary...