Table 2a.

Mothers’ Language Use and Corresponding Examples

Maternal language measure	Examples
Label	Those are frogs
Description	That’s a big dog
Open-ended question	What is happening here?
Closed-ended question	Did you like the book?
Reframe	That’s a trumpet, not a saxophone
Affirmation	Child says, “the boy is sad”; mother says, “yes, he is!”
Repetition	Child says, “frog”; mother repeats, “frog”
Request for repetition	What did you say? Can you repeat that?
Expansion	Child says, “run”; mother says, “they are running”
Extension	Child says, “beehive fall”; mother says, “the beehive fell, and all the bees flew out”
Recast	Child says, “frog jar”; mother says, “is the frog inside the jar?”
Direct action request	Turn the page
Indirect action request	Can you turn the page?
Attention directive	Here! Look at this
Positive feedback	That’s right! Good job!
Negative feedback	What you said was not okay! No, that’s wrong!