Explicit cognate instruction facilitates vocabulary learning by foreign language learners with developmental language disorder

This article is one of the first attempts to study mechanisms foreign language learning by children with DLD. We test effectiveness a cognate intervention aiming enhance cross-linguistic awareness Dutch-speaking primary-school pupils DLD, as part their English Foreign Language (EFL) curriculum. The participants were school subject in last three years special primary education Netherlands (ages 8;11–13;8). group ( n = 41) received 12 short lessons on relationships over course 14 weeks. control 46), matched amount and intensity instruction, regular that mainly implicit skill-based. used pre-test–post-test design compared development word recognition two groups, at same time controlling for prior EFL instruction out-of-school exposure English. performance pre-test was already high, particularly cognates. Word did not improve showed significant improvement from post-test. After intervention, they recognized only more words practised but also nontreated cognates, which demonstrates developed strategy allowed them recognize based similarity Dutch. conclude explicit implemented classroom setting facilitates vocabulary education.