Mobile touchscreen applications present new opportunities for children's language learning. This systematic review synthesizes the evidence on the impact of features of mobile applications on children's language learning. Experimental studies published from 2010 onwards with children aged 3 to 11 years old were included. Of the 1,081 studies screened, 11 studies were identified, which examined four features of mobile touchscreen applications: inbuilt narration, real-time conversation prompts, augmented reality (AR), and hotspots. Inbuilt narration had a positive impact on story comprehension and word learning compared to reading alone but not shared reading with an adult. Real-time conversation prompts improved the quality and quantity of adult-child talk, and AR supported language learning ostensibly via increased motivation. No evidence was found for an impact of text-relevant hotspots. Limitations of the existing literature are discussed, and a strong case is made for further research in the area, particularly that which builds on learning theory and existing qualitative research.New technologies can provide new opportunities for gaining language and literacy skills for adults and children. The field of Mobile Assisted Language Learning (MALL) has generated promising insights on language learning using digital technologies for adult learners (Lin & Lin, 2019;Sung, Chang, & Yang, 2015), and emerging research on mobile, touchscreen devices such as tablets and smartphones with adults and children suggests that these now ubiquitous tools can support language skills too (Godwin-Jones, 2017;Neumann & Neumann, 2017). Looking beyond questions of whether such technologies can support learning, new empirical research is exploring how, by examining which specific features of mobile touchscreen devices have an impact on language learning (Jin,

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Polysemy, or the property of words having multiple meanings, is a prevalent feature of vocabulary. In this study we validated a new measure of polysemy knowledge for children with English as an additional language (EAL) and a first language (EL1) and examined the relationship between polysemy knowledge and age, language status, and reading comprehension. Participants were 112 British children aged 5 to 6 (n = 61) or 8 to 9 years (n = 51), 37% of whom had EAL (n = 41). Participants completed the new measure of knowledge of polysemes, along with other measures of language, literacy and cognitive ability. The new measure was reliable and valid with EAL and EL1 children. Age and language status predicted children's polyseme knowledge. Polyseme knowledge uniquely contributed to reading comprehension after controlling for age, language status, non-verbal intelligence, time reading in English, and breadth of vocabulary. This research underscores the importance of polysemy for children's linguistic development.

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Most common words in English have multiple different meanings, but relatively little is known about why children grasp some meanings better than others. This study aimed to examine how variables at the child-level, wordform-level, and meaning-level impact knowledge of words with multiple meanings. In this study, 174 children aged 5- to 9-years-old completed a test of homonym knowledge, and measures of non-verbal intelligence and language background were collected. Psycholinguistic features of the wordforms tested were assessed through collecting adult ratings, corpus coding, and using existing databases. Logistic mixed effects models revealed that whilst the frequency of wordforms contributed to children’s knowledge, so also did dominance and imageability of the separate meanings of the word. Predictors were similar for children with English as an Additional Language and English as a first language. This greater understanding of why some word meanings are known better than others has significant implications for vocabulary learning.