Daniela O’Neill

NEW BLOG: We need to talk about oracy

A taste of my ResearchEd talk yesterday

learningfrommymistakesenglish.blogspot.com/2026/03/we-n...

...and the DLD Project Summit has gone live - such an amazing programme - run don't walk. FREE for the DLD community and only $39 for professionals; all the programme virtual and accessible for 3 months viewing #DevLangDis
thedldproject.com/dld-global-s...

Thanks! It was a great experience to do these studies with my very talented students, and also to write this paper 🙂

Getting Lost in a Book: The Science of Reading Comprehension Have you ever felt like you got to know a character in a story, or felt like you could imagine the world she lived in? Have you ever wondered why the books we read seem to come to life in our minds? S...

This is a very interesting question to ask and explore! You (and perhaps your students) might find it interesting to read a bit more our studies in this openaccess journal edited in part by youth. I wonder what their thoughts would be to your question! kids.frontiersin.org/articles/10....

We have looked at situation models largely while listening to stories (children were pre-readers) & found links to reading comprehension ability. But I am sure they come into play more widely, as in this new work with comics. I’m now working to pull more of this work together with educators in mind

Podcast episode 54: Neil Cohn on Speaking in Pictures In this interview, Neil Cohn tells us about his theory that visual art and spoken language draw on the same underlying cognitive abilities.

When pictures speak, they podcast 😉

Neil Cohn (@neilcohn.bsky.social) joins James McElvenny (@jamesmcelvenny.bsky.social) to talk about his new book and the shared cognitive foundations underlying visual art and spoken language.

🎙️ hiphilangsci.net/2026/02/01/p...

#Histlx

This is the first paper I know of the that has looked at how people comprehend spatial locations while reading comics, particularly compared to verbal narratives. Definitely worth checking out!

Having studied situation models in children while listening to stories, I’m very keen to read this! Thanks for sharing

The Language and Literacy in Young People is an amazing resource. Thanks to @suze-freogirl.bsky.social @me-boyo.bsky.social and team for creating such valuable and practical work.
Loads of free evidence based downloads. languageandliteracyinyoungpeople.com/resources/fr...
#DevLangDis

The Reading Brain – Transforming Vision into Language Reading is built upon transformations that map representations of written words to their pronunciations, names, and meanings. However, unlike many oth…

The Reading Brain – Transforming Vision into Language

www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Fascinating research by @dorsaamir.bsky.social et al finds marked variation in 4 cooperative behaviours—fairness, trustworthiness, forgiveness, and honesty—among children aged 5-13 in five societies, which converges toward the societal norms in middle childhood:

www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

What Explains the Relations Between Reading Comprehension and Written Composition? Findings from a Longitudinal Study This study investigated the relation between reading comprehension and written composition in Grade 2, as well as how language and literacy skills explain this connection. Additionally, it explored...

#Reading and #writing rely on a common set of foundational skills. Oral discourse and lexical literacy skills are the mediating factors. Handwriting is uniquely related to writing quality but not to reading #comprehension.

#research

www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

Interesting! But wish sources were all cited, as no links given to some of the studies mentioned (e.g., helping with small talk)

Promotional image for Speaking in Pictures by Neil Cohn

Happy Book Day! My graphic novel Speaking in Pictures is finally out in the world! I planned this book for over 20 years and spent 7 years writing and drawing it, so I hope everyone enjoys reading it as much as I did creating it 🥳 www.visuallanguagelab.com/sip

Awareness of Developmental Language Disorder (DLD) is increasing, but not where it needs to be.
People with DLD are making their voices heard, but not so much on BlueSky as it's largely word based.
Professionals can make a difference by posting and engaging with #DevLangDis content.
Join in!

‘I love you twenty-sixty times’: how lyrics written by a three-year-old became tear-inducing viral hits When Stephen Spencer began setting his daughter’s surreal stories to music, he had 36 followers. Now his banging pop miniatures have been streamed nearly 30m times – and are making parents cry

If you love children’s stories, you will love Stephen Spencer’s Instagram page 😄

‘I love you twenty-sixty times’: how lyrics written by a three-year-old became tear-inducing viral hits

www.theguardian.com/music/2026/f...

#youngchildren #parents #earlyyears #languagedevelopment
#Bskyspeechies

Check out this excellent episode of the Impact Society's podcast, Talking Impact featuring Dr. John Mighton and JUMP Math.

A child drawing of a female scientist. The hedline is: What does a scientist look like? Children are drawing women more than ever before

When asked to draw a scientist, school-age kids in the United States are increasingly sketching women, according to a study from 2018.

Read more on #WomenInScienceDay: https://scim.ag/4qFrPON

Sub-groups of spoken language and broader communication skills in a large heterogenous cohort of minimally verbal school-age children: evidence of discrepant profiles - Molecular Autism Molecular Autism - Communication and language profiles in neurodevelopmental conditions are characterised by enormous phenotypic heterogeneity. We sought to identify subgroups of Minimally Verbal...

I often don’t know what studies are using my Language Use Inventory, and so it’s always a nice surprise when This happens, as in this new study with minimally verbal children where it was used as part of their Communicative Competence measure link.springer.com/article/10.1...

#Bskyspeechies #autism

For more on the science and social function of small talk, this episode has been consistently popular among our autistic listeners

Does your toddler call every animal a dog? Or call the moon a ball?

Both are examples of a perfectly normal toddler behavior known as overextension.

Thread 🧵

Screenshot of springernature journal page saying "great news! fundign is available for open access publishing. Explore open access funding | change institution."

Table with profit margins from big publishers of research

Sad news! By choosing to publish with us, you are wasting a horrendous amount of tax money. Learn about Diamond Open Access and where to submit instead Buy yourself prestige here -->

Apparently, there is still funding left in academia even though Springer Nature made $489 million profits off of it in 2024. And now they are telling researchers what great news that is.

Let me fix this for you... (inspired by arxiv.org/abs/2511.04820)
#springernature #closedscience

Rereading it, I see just how much higher level vocabulary I was exposed to in reading comics, something I preach about often. I have compiled a list of this vocabulary in just this one story. Excitement and engagement kept me reading. The built-in scaffolding of image and text helped make meaning.

#openaccess #adolescence #developmentalpsychology

Many people have no mental imagery. What’s going on in their brains? People with aphantasia are offering a window into consciousness.

Most people can call up pictures in their minds, visualizing the past & summoning images of the future. But for ~4% of us, such mental imagery is weak or absent. New edition of @nature.com has a nice introduction to how research on this phenomenon (aphantasia) opens up novel windows into the brain.🧪

At my university, our library recently did a presentation to explain some reasons for why they had to cut certain journals, and I was incredibly impressed at the amount of data and factors they took into account. I could see if they would share this with you.

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AGING PLAYFULLY:
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We grow old if we stop playing...
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🎉 Congratulations!

🎉Chalk & Talk just surpassed 300,000 podcast downloads. YouTube views are up significantly too! My goal: improving math education by sharing knowledge about what works.
🙏Thanks for listening & please share the podcast with someone who could benefit. Channel link below.

Why we keep getting the cause of dyslexia wrong | BBC Science Focus Magazine Genetics, audio processing and environment can all impact how our brains connect sounds to the symbols we use to read

Check out this article featuring our work via BBC Science Focus. Thank you, Nate Scharping, for a thoughtful piece on #dyslexia and its causes:
"Why we keep getting the cause of dyslexia wrong."
www.sciencefocus.com/wellbeing/wh...