Language Speech and Hearing Services in Schools最新文献

Purpose: This study examines the linguistic skills that support the learning of science and social studies vocabulary words for second-grade Latino bilingual students.

Method: We used data from a cluster randomized study where second-grade classrooms within schools were randomly assigned to the intervention group (n = 13) or the control group (n = 13), with a total of 217 bilingual Latino students. Students in the intervention group received a researcher-developed explicit vocabulary intervention focused on science and social studies word learning. The control group received business-as-usual instruction. Using confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) and structural equation modeling (SEM), we examined the association of early language skills at pretest and their relation to word learning outcomes in science and social studies, as measured by the production of definitions and sentences post-intervention.

Results: The six language tasks assessed exhibited significant moderate correlations with one another and vocabulary outcomes, indicating a potential underlying relation. These indicator variables load into a singular latent factor when analyzed using CFA. Using SEM, the language factor (f1) significantly predicted student capacity to produce definitions and sentences. After accounting for the benefits of the intervention, these effects of f1 remained strongly associated to definitions and sentence production.

Conclusions: Learning content vocabulary is significantly related to student language skills in Spanish and in English. This finding suggests that developing student language skills early facilitates the learning of curricular vocabulary words later. This finding has key implications for teaching and learning content vocabulary for bilingually developing students. Theoretical and practical applications for instruction of bilingual students are discussed.

Supplemental material: https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.29711267.

Purpose: The present study aimed to examine the validity and reliability of the Malay Teacher's Evaluation of Aural/Oral Performance of Children Plus (TEACH+) Rating Scale for measuring functional hearing of preschoolers in Malaysia.

Method: The TEACH+ was adapted into Malay. Fourteen teachers from a preschool completed the Malay TEACH+ Scale for 96 preschool children with normal hearing. Additionally, eight teachers repeated the assessment within a month. Validity and reliability were examined, and normative scores were derived.

Results: The adapted scale was found to be valid with high content validity (item-content validity index = .88-1.0), face validity, and construct validity. Reliability tests shows good internal consistency (α = .9), corrected item-total correlation values (.65-.91), and overall test-retest reliability (intraclass correlation coefficient = .79-.88). The TEACH+ scores showed that functional performance of children ages < 36 months was poorer than older children, and performance in quiet was better than performance in noise. The normative data can be used as a guide to monitor auditory functional performance and listening efforts of Malaysian children ages > 36 months in preschool settings.

Conclusion: The Malay TEACH+ Rating Scale is a valid and reliable tool for teachers to identify preschool-age children who may need additional support to optimize their functional hearing.

Purpose: The aims of this study were to (a) investigate speech-in-noise perception using an adaptive procedure in school-aged children with bilateral cochlear implants (CIs); (b) evaluate the impact of chronological age, age at the second implantation, and interimplant interval on auditory performance in children with bilateral CIs; and (c) determine the correlation between speech recognition performance and subjective parental questionnaire scores.

Method: A total of 24 school-aged children with bilateral CIs participated in this study, divided into two groups: Group I (younger than 108 months of age, n = 12) and Group II (older than 108 months of age, n = 12). Speech recognition performance was assessed using sentences from the Turkish Hearing in Noise Test for Children under both quiet and noisy conditions at an adaptive signal-to-noise ratio. The auditory behavior of the children in daily life was evaluated by interviewing parents using the Parent's Evaluation of Aural/Oral Performance of Children (PEACH) scale.

Results: The Quiet and Noise Composite Scores of Group II were significantly better than those of Group I (p = .033 and p = .041, respectively). However, no significant difference was observed between the PEACH scores of the groups (p = .378). A significant correlation was found between PEACH scores and speech recognition performance under both quiet (p = .009) and noisy conditions (p = .021).

Conclusions: Chronological age had a greater impact on speech recognition performance than age at the second implantation and interimplant interval, emphasizing the role of age-related auditory development in speech perception. Additionally, parental perspective questionnaires may serve as a practical and efficient tool for assessing functional hearing abilities in children, particularly in educational settings where standard speech perception tests may not always be feasible.

Purpose: Many state standards for elementary students require them to use complex syntax, and research has documented age-related increases in the production of complex utterances in elementary-aged school children. Speech-language pathologists who provide services for these children, however, need detailed information in order to plan curriculum relevant intervention. The purpose of this study is to examine the production of specific subordinate (i.e., nominal, relative, and adverbial) and coordinate clauses obtained from 50-utterance conversational language samples of children between 5 and 10 years of age.

Method: The data sample included 200 children with typical language development, who ranged in age from 5;0 (years;months) to 10;11 (female = 103; male = 97). Fifty utterance conversational language samples were examined for children's use of subordinate clauses (nominal, relative, and adverbial) and coordinate clauses.

Results: Results indicated no statistically significant increases in the use of nominal clauses (p = .937), relative clauses (p = .09), adverbial clauses (p = .727), or the coordinating conjunction "and" (p = .587). The results indicated statistically significant increases in the use of the coordinating conjunctions "but" (p = .009) and "so" (p = .019). For every 1 month increase in age, the use of "but" increased by 0.9% and the use of "so" increased by 1%.

Conclusions: The results of this study indicated that, as children's age increased, they produced more utterances with the coordinating conjunctions "but" and "so." Furthermore, irrespective of children's age, approximately 30% of complex utterances included a nominal and/or adverbial subordinate clause. These results were obtained from 50-utterance language samples and further support the use of language sampling to develop intervention goals and monitor progress in intervention.

Purpose: The school speech-language pathologist (SLP) plays a critical role in increasing positive outcomes for children who need language intervention, but SLPs must navigate a variety of challenges (e.g., large caseloads, multiple demands on professional time) to incorporate effective, evidence-based language intervention practices. The purpose of this clinical focus is to describe an ongoing researcher-practitioner collaboration focused on increasing the use of evidence-based practices for academic language intervention by school SLPs in a mid-size school district.

Method: We present three feasible strategies identified and implemented in our collaboration: (1) rely on partners and peers, (2) embrace incremental change, and (3) sustain momentum and scale up. We provide a brief summary of the evidence base to guide clinical practice in two areas of language intervention, narrative intervention and academic vocabulary intervention, and describe our approach for increasing the use of these intervention practices using the three strategies. We share examples and ideas (e.g., targeted professional development, peer-to-peer learning, and collaboration with other educators) that can inform other similar efforts to support SLPs in evidence-based intervention.

Conclusions: It is feasible to support school SLPs in their use of evidence-based practices in language intervention, but it requires ongoing effort to sustain momentum. We conclude by discussing challenges and facilitators for implementation and describing potential for future work.

Purpose: Parents of children with developmental language disorder (DLD) have unique support needs. While support groups have a strong evidence base, they have not been adapted for use with this population. Our goal was to explore support needs among parents of children with DLD and their perspectives on participating in a support group.

Method: We conducted semistructured interviews with 12 caregivers of children with DLD. We asked questions about existing support needs, coping strategies, and hypothetical participation in a support group. Systematic text condensation was used to identify themes and subthemes within parent responses.

Results: Participants reported that systemic issues (e.g., Individualized Education Program processes, insurance coverage) hindered their ability to access evaluation and treatment services for their child. They also reported informational needs, such as wanting to know more about DLD, and challenges locating trustworthy resources. Emotional support needs included mental health challenges, as well as feelings of isolation and guilt. Finally, participants expressed interest in joining support groups and identified ways in which attendance would address emotional and informational needs.

Conclusions: Within our sample, participants were dissatisfied with practices in evaluation and treatment for children with DLD. They wanted more information from speech-language pathologists and other service providers and described difficult emotions that accompanied raising a child with DLD. We propose that parent support groups, a flexible and low-cost option, may address these needs from parents of children with DLD.

Supplemental material: https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.29373977.

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to determine how children from across the world draw themselves talking and to apply an interdisciplinary analysis to understand children's perspectives to improve delivery of services.

Method: Participants were 200 children from 24 countries who submitted a drawing of themselves talking to someone using the Early Childhood Voices Drawing Protocol. Drawings were uploaded to Charles Sturt University's Children Draw Talking Global Online Gallery. The participants were 2-12 years old (M = 6.13) and spoke 23 languages, and 28.5% of caregivers reported concerns about their children's talking. A 16-member interdisciplinary research team analyzed the drawings using descriptive, developmental, focal point, meaning-making, and systemic functional linguistics transitivity analysis frameworks.

Results: Children could draw themselves talking. The participants' age and ability to draw a human figure were strongly correlated. Most participants reported they felt happy about talking and drew themselves talking to one or more conversational partners, with focal points that included body parts and facial expressions, talking and listening, proximity to others, relationships and connections, and positivity and vibrancy. The cultural-historical meaning-making analysis identified 10 themes: relationships, places, actions, natural elements, human-made elements, cultural experiences, logical thinking, emotion, imagination, and concepts. The systemic functional linguistics transitivity analysis identified 71 processes, 134 participants, and 48 circumstances indicating richness in the children's depictions of talking.

Conclusions: Children across the world can use drawing to communicate who they talk to (e.g., friends, family, animals, professionals), when and where they talk (e.g., outside, at home), what they talk about (e.g., toys, animals, friends, family), and how they feel about talking (e.g., happy). These insights promote understanding of children's communication and inform how children's insights can be included in assessment and intervention.

Purpose: Typically developing multilingual children's speech may include mismatches and phonological patterns that are atypical in monolingual peers. One possible reason for mismatches is cross-linguistic transfer, when structures unique to one language are used while speaking another language. This study explored cross-linguistic transfer in Vietnamese-English-speaking children's and adults' speech at phoneme and syllable levels.

Method: Children (n = 66) aged between 2;0 and 8;10 (years;months) and adult family members (n = 83) completed single-word speech assessments in Vietnamese and English. Cross-linguistic transfer of nonshared consonants was analyzed in terms of frequency, patterns, and direction of transfer. Syllable structure patterns in English consonant clusters (cluster reduction, cluster simplification, epenthesis) were identified, as consonant clusters do not occur in Vietnamese.

Results: Cross-linguistic transfer of nonshared consonants occurred in most children's speech at least twice (75.76%, n = 66), tended to happen when the target was nonshared and occurred at a low frequency. During Vietnamese speech assessment, 21.82% of children's and 26.30% of adults' mismatches were due to cross-linguistic transfer of English consonants. During English speech assessment, 2.84% of children's and 24.33% of adults' mismatches were due to cross-linguistic transfer of Vietnamese consonants. Direction of cross-linguistic transfer was significantly associated with children's age and language proficiency. Bidirectional cross-linguistic transfer only occurred in the youngest children (2;6-4;5). English consonant clusters were impacted by syllable structure patterns for both children (35.76%) and adults (22.95%), indicating these mismatches in Vietnamese-English-speaking children's speech may be due to development, cross-linguistic transfer of Vietnamese syllable structure to English, and/or ambient phonology.

Conclusions: Cross-linguistic transfer occurred in Vietnamese-English-speaking children's and adults' speech. These findings highlight the importance of assessing multilingual children's speech in each language, considering interaction between languages, and identifying reasons for mismatches to ensure accurate diagnosis.

Supplemental material: https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.29955113.

Purpose: Adolescents with developmental language disorder (DLD) are an underserved population. Having DLD affects adolescents' academic and eventual economic success, supporting the need for accurate, clinically feasible DLD screening tools for adolescents. The objective of this review is to identify clinically feasible screening tools for adolescents and to appraise the quality of the methods used in studies that report the classification accuracy of the identified screeners.

Method: Records were included that described empirical studies of brief tasks to identify risk for DLD in 12- to 21-year-old participants with DLD or typical language. A systematic search of PubMed, PsycINFO, and Web of Science was conducted together with reviews of language disorder textbooks and four prior systematic reviews. In all, 15 records describing potential DLD screening tasks met the inclusion criteria and were summarized. Included records described studies with participant ages that overlapped the target age range, but none included only participants in the 12-21 year range. The quality of all included studies was appraised using the Quality Assessment of Diagnostic Accuracy Studies 2 (QUADAS-2) protocol.

Results: Six of 15 potential screening tasks reported diagnostic accuracy metrics, three of which demonstrated clinically useful levels of classification accuracy to screen adolescents at risk for DLD. None of the studies that evaluated the included screening tools fully met QUADAS-2 standards for avoiding risks of bias that may have affected diagnostic accuracy findings.

Conclusions: Two commercially available screening tasks are available in English to screen adolescents for DLD. One task evaluated in the research literature is available in Danish. Other potentially useful screening tasks have not been fully evaluated for their diagnostic accuracy. The QUADAS-2 review identified opportunities for screener developers to employ more rigorous methods to determine the classification accuracy of screeners; this will allow clinicians to have more confidence in the reported findings.

Supplemental material: https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.30057850.