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Shared reading represents an established practice to foster preschool vocabulary development, particularly when coupled with explicit instruction in word meanings. However, a question remains as to whether explicit word definitions detract from story delivery and hence language learning. Accordingly, this study compared explicit versus story-focused, elaborative storytelling in a 2 × 2 pre-posttest randomized and counterbalanced mixed design with 63 preschoolers. Children were told two fairytales daily across three sessions in either explicit or elaborative conditions, whereby target words were accompanied with either an explicit (e.g., definition, question) or elaborative (e.g., gesture, metaphor, rhetorical question) word learning technique. Stories were either read aloud or freely told by experimenters. Both conditions resulted in similarly large gains in target vocabulary and performance on a story retelling. Some differential effects were found, with there being a larger difference between explained versus incidental words in the explicit condition. Furthermore, children in the elaborative condition were less restless during storytelling. The findings suggest that both elaborative as well as explicit approaches promote vocabulary growth and provide some evidence of differential effects for child behavior during storytelling.

Shared-book reading is a well-established intervention to foster vocabulary development. Factors influencing its effectiveness are, however, less well studied, particularly with regard to story-delivery. We contrasted a read-aloud with a free storytelling approach and tested effects on vocabulary learning. In the first study, 83 preschoolers aged three to six were told six stories in a randomised, single-blind and counterbalanced design. Stories were either read aloud or told freely and included rare target-words. Measures of target-word acquisition, receptive vocabulary, phonological working memory and speech comprehension were administered. There was a small to moderate learning gain (d = 0.37), but no effect of story-delivery. In a second study, 24 of the youngest and 24 of the oldest participants were tested again, using the same procedure but with stories designed to be more intrinsically motivating and age-appropriate. Results indicated negligible vocabulary gains (d = 0.08) and no effect of story-delivery, except for small differences in child behaviour during storytelling.

From its very beginnings, we can discern two methodological approaches to comparative education; one broadly historical-philosophical-idiographic and another broadly empirical-positivist-nomothetic. Friedrich August Hecht's 1795-1798 "De re scholastica Anglica cum Germanica comparata" ("English and German school education compared"), with its hermeneutic textbook analysis, represents an idiographic methodology. Whilst the 1816/1817 data-driven research programme of Marc-Antoine Jullien--usually considered the origin of comparative education--represents an empirical-positivist-nomothetic approach. In this essay, we will examine the theoretical orientations of Hecht's study--his ideas of transnationality and national character, and his avoidance of the proposal of borrowing and lending. We situate the beginnings of Hecht's methodology in its social-historical context and analyse the transfer of interpretation methods from philology to comparative education. Finally, we will postulate a combination of Jullien's and Hecht's methodological approaches.

The Latin essay "De re Scholastica Anglica cum Germanica Comparata" (English and German school education compared) published in 1795-1798 by the Freiberg/Saxony grammar school principal Friedrich August Hecht is the first treatise in comparative education. The rediscovery of the text, its earlier mentioning in the history of comparative education, its main content, e.g. comparison of English Public Schools to German urban grammar schools, detailed textbook comparison, and interpretation, e.g. idea of transnationality vs. concept of the national character, are described. The social-historical situation of the beginning of comparative education is analyzed.