This text focuses on children's language, literacy and learning. Based on the Bristol study "Language at Home and at School", which the author directed, it follows the development of a representative sample of children from their first words to the end of primary education. Children play an active role in their own learning, constructing an internal model of the world and a linguistic system for communicating about it. The author draws on his experience as a parent, teacher and educator to suggest ways in which adults can help children achieve their full potential as makers of meaning and creators of knowledge.