The acquisition of language is a human universal, achieved by all normal children raised in normal environments. However, normal environments vary widely, with consequences for children’s language development. This chapter introduces the subsequent chapters in this edited volume, providing historical background and presenting findings from two contemporary research projects. The historical background includes shifts in the field of language acquisition from linguistics to a bioecological model of development as the guiding theoretical framework, shifts from universals of language acquisition to individual differences as the outcome to be explained, and multiple methodological advances that have made possible much of the research presented in this book. The current empirical work presented in this chapter includes one project on language development in the bilingual context of immigrant families in the United States and another project on home and childcare influences on the language and preliteracy skill development of children in Denmark, in the context of near-universal childcare attendance.

In order for children to become engaged readers, it is important for them to develop the component reading skills that lead to long-term reading success and to find reading enjoyable. Both reading motivation and skill acquisition are central to reading development and continued growth over time. However, the relationship between these two prerequisites for becoming a lifelong reader is dynamic and bidirectional, suggesting that there are many different opportunities to intervene when children are disengaged or struggling readers. School psychologists can play a role in the prevention of and intervention in both reading and motivational challenges. This chapter includes information about how school psychologists might approach these issues using a tiered systems-of-support framework, while taking the home literacy environment into account.