Narrative Language Intervention for English Language Learners

A preliminary study was designed to determine whether ELL children responded favorably to a revised version ofthe narrative intervention procedure previously utilized with children with language impairment. This study employed a pre-test, post-test design with 11 ELL children ranging in age from 8;8 (years;months) to 9;2 (years;months) who were at-risk for language and learning problems. Children were administered the recalling sentences subtest ofthe Clinical Evaluation of Language Fundamentals-4 in English and Spanish, Frog Stories requiring them to tell a story that paralleled to a wordless picture book about the adventures \u27of a frog in English, and the Test ofNarrative Language in English and Spanish before and after intervention. Children were seen 30-45 minutes per day, 4 days per week for a total of6 weeks in groups ofthree or four. An ELL teacher administered the intervention program using graphic organizers and icons to teach appropriate story grammar structure. Results concluded that after the intervention was administered scores in both English and Spanish language and narrative components increased

A Randomized Controlled Trial of a Play-Based, Peer-Mediated Pragmatic Language Intervention for Children With Autism

Purpose: This randomized controlled trial evaluated the effectiveness of a play-based pragmatic language intervention for children with autism. Methods: A sample of 71 children with autism were randomized to an intervention-first group (n = 28 analyzed) or waitlist-first (n = 34 analyzed) group. Children attended 10, weekly clinic play-sessions with a typically developing peer, and parents mediated practice components at home. The Pragmatics Observational Measure (POM-2) and the Social Emotional Evaluation (SEE) evaluated pragmatics before, after and 3-months following the intervention. Results: POM-2 gains were greatest for intervention-first participants (p = 0.031, d = 0.57). Treatment effects were maintained at 3-month follow-up (p < 0.001–0.05, d = 0.49–0.64). POM-2 scores were not significantly different in the clinic and home settings at follow-up. Conclusion: Findings support the combination of play, peer-mediation, video-feedback and parent training to enhance pragmatic language in children with autism

Cognitive and linguistic effects of narrative-based language intervention in children with Developmental Language Disorder

Background and aims: Narrative-based language intervention provides a naturalistic context for targeting overall story structure and specific syntactic goals in children with Developmental Language Disorder (DLD). Given the cognitive demands of narratives, narrative-based language intervention also has the potential to positively impact related abilities such as working memory and academic skills. Methods: Ten children (8–11 years old) with DLD completed 15 sessions of narrative-based language intervention. Results: Results of single subject data revealed gains in language for five participants, four of whom improved on a probe tapping working memory. An additional four participants improved on a working memory probe only. On standardized measures, clinically significant gains were noted for one additional participant on a language measure and one additional participant on a visuospatial working memory. Carry over to reading was noted for three participants and to math for one participant. Across measures, gains in both verbal and visuospatial working memory were common. A responder analysis revealed that improvement in language may be associated with higher verbal short-term memory and receptive language at baseline. Those with working memory impairments were among those showing the fewest improvements across measures. Conclusions: Narrative-based language intervention impacted verbal skills in different ways across individual children with DLD. Implications: Further research is needed to gain an understanding of who benefits most from narrative-based language intervention

Efficacy of language intervention in the early years

Background: Oral language skills in the preschool and early school years are critical to educational success and provide the foundations for the later development of reading comprehension. Methods: In a randomized controlled trial, 180 children from 15 UK nursery schools (n = 12 from each setting; Mage = 4;0) were randomly allocated to receive a 30-week oral language intervention or to a waiting control group. Children in the intervention group received 30 weeks of oral language intervention, beginning in nursery (preschool), in three group sessions per week, continuing with daily sessions on transition to Reception class (pre-Year 1). The intervention was delivered by nursery staff and teaching assistants trained and supported by the research team. Following screening, children were assessed preintervention, following completion of the intervention and after a 6-month delay. Results: Children in the intervention group showed significantly better performance on measures of oral language and spoken narrative skills than children in the waiting control group immediately after the 30 week intervention and after a 6 month delay. Gains in word-level literacy skills were weaker, though clear improvements were observed on measures of phonological awareness. Importantly, improvements in oral language skills generalized to a standardized measure of reading comprehension at maintenance test. Conclusions: Early intervention for children with oral language difficulties is effective and can successfully support the skills, which underpin reading comprehensio

Parental Stress and its Relation to Parental Perceptions of Communication Following Language Intervention

Current research indicates that parents of children with developmental disabilities experience more parental stress than parents of typically developing children, yet most are able to successfully cope with the additional care giving demands. There has been little research however, on the role of the communication ability of children with developmental disabilities on parental stress. This study examined the effects of a parent-implemented language intervention on parental stress and its relation to parental perceptions of communication development in young toddlers (N = 59) and their parents. Results indicate that parent stress did not decrease significantly following language intervention. Parents’ perceptions about the severity of their child’s communication deficits partially mediated the relationship between expressive language at baseline and parent stress at post-intervention. In addition, exploratory results begin to support the idea that parents who are initially high in parent stress are able to decrease their overall parent stress following language intervention

Controlled trial of lovastatin combined with an open-label treatment of a parent-implemented language intervention in youth with fragile X syndrome.

BackgroundThe purpose of this study was to conduct a 20-week controlled trial of lovastatin (10 to 40 mg/day) in youth with fragile X syndrome (FXS) ages 10 to 17 years, combined with an open-label treatment of a parent-implemented language intervention (PILI), delivered via distance video teleconferencing to both treatment groups, lovastatin and placebo.MethodA randomized, double-blind trial was conducted at one site in the Sacramento, California, metropolitan area. Fourteen participants were assigned to the lovastatin group; two participants terminated early from the study. Sixteen participants were assigned to the placebo group. Lovastatin or placebo was administered orally in a capsule form, starting at 10 mg and increasing weekly or as tolerated by 10 mg increments, up to a maximum dose of 40 mg daily. A PILI was delivered to both groups for 12 weeks, with 4 activities per week, through video teleconferencing by an American Speech-Language Association-certified Speech-Language Pathologist, in collaboration with a Board-Certified Behavior Analyst. Parents were taught to use a set of language facilitation strategies while interacting with their children during a shared storytelling activity. The main outcome measures included absolute change from baseline to final visit in the means for youth total number of story-related utterances, youth number of different word roots, and parent total number of story-related utterances.ResultsSignificant increases in all primary outcome measures were observed in both treatment groups. Significant improvements were also observed in parent reports of the severity of spoken language and social impairments in both treatment groups. In all cases, the amount of change observed did not differ across the two treatment groups. Although gains in parental use of the PILI-targeted intervention strategies were observed in both treatment groups, parental use of the PILI strategies was correlated with youth gains in the placebo group and not in the lovastatin group.ConclusionParticipants in both groups demonstrated significant changes in the primary outcome measures. The magnitude of change observed across the two groups was comparable, providing additional support for the efficacy of the use of PILI in youth with FXS.Trial registrationUS National Institutes of Health (ClinicalTrials.gov), NCT02642653. Registered 12/30/2015

Toward an Integrated Framework for Language Testing and Intervention

An integrated framework for language testing and intervention with a paradigm T??LI?T? was proposed and illustrated. The proposed framework combines approaches from Error Analysis, Need Analysis and Systems Instruction. The operation of the framework was illustrated based on the data derived from a corpus consisting of the transcripts of hundred (100) students from a college in Yola metropolis. The transcripts were analyzed using the COMPFORM-MARKCHART method of error correction. The test served as a pre-intervention language test and the first component of the framework (T?). The result of the analysis was then used to design the ERROR PROFILE of the students. Based on this profile, a Language Intervention technique (LI) comprising of two sub-components was designed; that is Language Teaching for Common and Specific Errors [LTCSE] and Language Task for Specific Students [LTSS]. The last component of the framework is a post language intervention test [T?] which was designed to test the efficacy of the language method/approach adopted. The paper concludes with a discussion on the prospects of the framework within the context of Teaching English as a Second Language (TESL).Keywords: Pretest, language Intervention, Post-test, EDP, LTCSE, LTSS.

Reconstructing Teachers’ Language Intervention for Phonological Aspects in EFL Classroom

Teachers’ language intervention can play a key role in helping students in the classroom interaction to learn a foreign language. In this paper, we discuss the teacher’s language intervention for phonological aspects in the English as a Foreign Language (EFL) classroom. We used a qualitative descriptive approach with a phenomenological research design. As the data, we recorded the language exchanges between the students and their teachers at the fifth year of a Primary School (Sekolah Dasar) in Bandar Lampung, Indonesia. We categorized three types of teachers’ language intervention, i.e. focalization, correction, and solicitation. Focalization intervention is manifested by the production of a lexical element. The intervention was observed in three situations, namely when reading familiar and unfamiliar English short stories, and playing a game with cards containing English words with their respective pictures, introduced in the stories. The teachers’ language interventions were coded in relation to phonological aspects, i.e. phoneme, syllable, and rhyme. The results show that there are 159 interventions in total. The teachers’ language interventions have the number of speech turns and the duration of the interactions varied in accordance with the context of situation, the Speech-turns mostly occur in reading unfamiliar English stories either for focalization, correction, or solicitation. Thus, this study concluded that teachers intervened more often in reading time of unfamiliar English stories, used focalization more frequently in the intervention, and utilized syllables more preferably as the focus in the intervention. As the implication, variability in the frequency and nature of interventions by the teachers could be at the origin of the differences observed in the performance of students

Speech and Language Intervention for Schizophrenia: An Interdisciplinary Survey Study

According to the Scope of Practice for speech-language pathologists (SLPs), set forth by the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association, SLPs are responsible for offering therapy to individuals with psychiatric illnesses, including schizophrenia. People with schizophrenia often struggle with social use of language which may lead to difficulty maintaining relationships and employment. These individuals may also experience negative stigma as a result of expressive and receptive language difficulties. Although the treatment of schizophrenia has traditionally remained in the realm of psychiatry, some studies have shown that individuals with schizophrenia can benefit from speech-language therapy. The purpose of this study was to examine schizophrenia from a communication sciences perspective. An anonymous online survey was completed by individuals involved with either psychology, audiology, or speech-language sciences (n=221) in order to determine what differences are present in knowledge and beliefs of the role of language in schizophrenia. The results show that there are significant differences in knowledge and beliefs about schizophrenia between the fields of psychology and communication sciences which may have implications for the need for further involvement of SLPs in the treatment of schizophrenia