Oxford Events, the new replacement for OxTalks, will launch on 16th March. From now until the launch of Oxford Events, new events cannot be published or edited on OxTalks while all existing records are migrated to the new platform. The existing OxTalks site will remain available to view during this period.
From 16th, Oxford Events will launch on a new website: events.ox.ac.uk, and event submissions will resume. You will need a Halo login to submit events. Full details are available on the Staff Gateway.
Across development, children continually encounter new words and incorporate these words into their vocabulary. This ability to learn new words in turn influences how children process spoken language, which subsequently lays a critical foundation for reading development. A key area in which these relationships are observed is the extent to which children are sensitive to phonological similarity, or overlap in sound information between words (e.g., rhyming words such as cake and lake).
In the first part of the talk, I will review two studies which have revealed that children with reading and language challenges experience difficulties learning, remembering, and processing phonologically similar spoken words. Following this, I will discuss a new study our group is conducting that uses repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) to test a causal model of word learning and processing in the brain. By performing these studies, our aim is to contribute to the development of brain-informed approaches for promoting optimal language and reading acquisition in individuals with learning challenges.