Dr. Seuss Week is observed from Monday, March 2, through Friday, March 6, highlighting the significance of early reading through the quirky and rhythmic style found in Theodor Seuss Geisel’s cherished books.
The nonsensical language that has characterized so many Dr. Seuss books has proven to be an enormous benefit for younger readers, aiding several areas including phonics development, articulation, vocabulary growth and more. The “Seuss Science” is praised by literacy experts worldwide for fueling better cognitive and language development.
Florida State University’s Beth Phillips is a dual faculty member, serving as professor of education psychology within the Anne Spencer Daves College of Education, Health, and Human Sciences. She is also an associate director at the Florida Center for Reading Research (FCRR). Her research interests include the overlap between early literacy and language development, preschool curriculum and instruction, professional development of early childhood educators, and parental influences on learning.
Phillips says Dr. Seuss’s “pseudowords,” illogical words that actually help early readers, are a foundational part of children building their reading and literacy skills.
“Pseudowords are one of my favorite aspects of Dr. Seuss books,” Phillips said. “Hearing about a ‘wumbus’ and being ‘duddled’ makes children excited about words and what they might mean. Scientists who study vocabulary call this word consciousness – the metacognitive focus on words and their meaning.”
Phillips adds that reading these invented words brings out a curiosity in young readers that can have a long-term benefit.
“Dr. Seuss’ books can spark word consciousness in young children and even older readers,” Phillips said. “This can be of great importance because having this drive to learn about what words mean is associated with actually learning more words.”
The FCRR is an interdisciplinary research center at FSU that investigates all aspects of reading and reading-related skills across the lifespan. Through rigorous and robust research, innovation and engagement, FCRR advances the science of reading to improve learning and achievement from birth through adulthood.
Media interested in learning the science behind Dr. Seuss books and how they aid in language and cognitive development can reach out to Beth Phillips at bphillips@fcrr.org.
Beth Phillips, associate director, Florida Center for Reading Research
Another staple of Dr. Seuss was his rhyme and repetition patterns that make his books entertaining. How do these rhythmic patterns enhance early readers?
The rhyming aspect of Dr. Seuss books helps children to learn one of the key foundational early literacy skills that underpin successful independent reading —phonological awareness. This is the capacity to notice and manipulate the sound structure of words independent from their meaning. So, being able to recognize that ham, am and Sam all sound the same at the end because they share the same ending sound (rime) -am is one element of phonological awareness and one that children often can gain some skill at by the time they are four-years-old, before the beginning of formal reading instruction. This means that these books can help children go into their formal reading instruction in kindergarten with more confidence about learning to read and more ease in acquiring the sound-spelling correspondences necessary for fluent reading.
If you could pinpoint the biggest area of impact that Dr. Seuss’ books have on young readers, what would it be?
I think the biggest impact of these books is motivation. Dr. Seuss books are fun! They have amazing, fanciful pictures that spark children’s imaginations and that make them laugh. Children are engaged by these books, and their attention is captured by the rhythmic pattern of the text, which also then helps them to learn that it is the words (the text) that are telling the stories, not the pictures. This is a big step for a very young child to learn the secrets of books and how they work.