Enhancing preschoolers' vocabulary through family literacy programs

Contains fulltext : 191304.pdf (publisher's version ) (Open Access)Radboud University, 08 juni 2018Promotores : Verhoeven, L.T.W., Oostdam, R.J. Co-promotor : Molenaar, I.184 p

Technology-enhanced storytelling stimulating parent-child interaction and preschool children's vocabulary knowledge

Preschool children's vocabulary mainly develops verbal through interaction. Therefore, the technology-enhanced storytelling (TES) activity Jeffy's Journey is developed to support parent-child interaction and vocabulary in preschool children. TES entails shared verbal storytelling supported by a story structure and real-time visual, auditory and textual prompts on a tablet computer. In this exploratory study, we investigated how TES influenced parent-child interaction and vocabulary. An experimental pretest-intervention-posttest design was followed with 44 3-year-old children and their parents in the experimental group and 27 peers in the control group. Results revealed that TES stimulated active child involvement and generated parent-child interaction, yet a great variety in TES characteristics both in time spent and usage of prompts was found among participants. Dyads that spent more time on story phases showed more and higher quality parent–child interaction. The usage of prompts was associated with improved parent-child interaction quality. Finally, an effect of TES was evidenced on children's productive vocabulary knowledge. To conclude, this study demonstrates that TES can be considered as a promising context for fostering parent-child interaction and children's vocabulary development

Helping parents enhance vocabulary development in preschool children: Effects of a family literacy program

Item does not contain fulltextFamily literacy programs seek to improve a wide range of developmental aspects, of which an important one is how parents develop their children's vocabulary. The effects of these programs are limited, partly because they appear to give insufficient guidance and support to parents in changing how they interact with their children. To increase the impact of family literacy programs, two ways to support parents in changing their interaction behavior were examined: active learning during parent group meetings (AL) and technology-enhanced learning with real-time interaction support (TL). The effects on vocabulary were investigated in children involved in preschool education programs. In an experimental design with partially randomized clusters, 223 preschool children were enrolled in a family literacy program with AL, TL or in the control condition without a family literacy program. Results showed that children in the AL condition made larger receptive vocabulary gains than control children, whereas TL children showed similar gains to controls. Children in all three conditions made similar gains in productive vocabulary. These results demonstrate the strength of AL and shows the complexity of implementing TL