Language and literacy development are deeply intertwined in complex ways, so much so that the development of skilled reading involves a major re-organization of language systems in the brain. In this panel we will approach the relationship between language and literacy development from a neurocognitive perspective. Kenneth Pugh (Haskins Laboratories/Yale University) will present research on the neural bases of learning to read across writing systems, with particular focus on bi-directional relations between spoken and written language. His research suggests that print/speech convergence in language cortex drives individual differences in reading outcomes, that there are critical gene-brain-cognitive factors in early language development that can impact later language and reading outcomes, and that reading remediation/treatment moderates neurocognitive trajectories. Arturo E. Hernandez (University of Houston) will show how sensorimotor plasticity and cognitive flexibility relate to the neurocognitive adaptations seen in bilinguals, covering structural brain differences in monolinguals and bilinguals and the adaptations of the basal ganglia and frontostriatal tracts as a gating mechanism crucial for selecting the correct motor response. Implications of these findings will be discussed with regard to Neuroemergentism, a novel framework which sees language development as involving the organization and reorganization of cognition and its underlying neural substrate. Augusto Buchweitz (PUCRS) will address the brain bases of early literacy, focusing on its main vectors: knowledge and skills that allow for the emergence of literacy and successful instruction. His talk will also show how the human brain interacts with the environment and with these vectors, with an emphasis on his work on developmental dyslexia in Brazil, and will claim that, in early literacy, the time for learning is that of the brain’s.