My Profile

Biography:

My research interests related to CLLRNet’s goals span two broad areas - reading development and communication development in children,- and have been/are funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada and CLLRNet.
One of my research programs concerns literacy development in young children with a particular focus on how parents contribute to children’s language and literacy learning, and their beliefs and goals in these areas. Central to this are their interactions with children during shared reading across the age range four through seven, when children move from being read to to taking on the reader role. In this research we are considering both children whose progress is within the normal range, as well as those whose progress is delayed. The other focuses on the communicative and language skills of shy children, and tries to understand their discourse patterns with adults and peers and what might account for the differences observed in their performance on language tests and in interaction with others.
As a professor of psychology and Director of Training with the University of Guelph’s Clinical Psychology: Applied Developmental Emphasis Program, I teach courses on cognitive assessment and learning disabilities and am the Director of Clinical Training. Within the University’s Learning Opportunity Program, I consult with the Centre for Students with Disabilities and teach a course on learning disabilities to students who have been diagnosed as such.