Increasing Literate Language Use in Preschoolers: An Interprofessional

Collaboration

Hailey McClain, B.S.

Leah McComack, B.S.

LaDonna Atkins, Ed.D., CFLE

Susan Benson, Ph.D., CCC-SLP

SLPEarly Childhood Educator

Disclosures

This project was funded through a University of Central Oklahoma Interdisciplinary Grant and through a University of Central Oklahoma STLR Student Project Award.

Dr. Susan Benson is an Assistant Professor in he Speech-Language Pathology Program at the University of Central Oklahoma(UCO). Portions of this presentation were developed as part of paid employment at UCO. As a speaker, her employer paid for the registration fee for this Conference.

Hailey McClain and Leah McComack are both graduate students at the University of Central Oklahoma. They served as paid research assistants while completing this project.

Vocabulary Instruction

What do I teach?

the literate lexicon

words by category

functional vocabulary

Literate Language Feature Example

Elaborated noun phrase – noun phrase with two or more modifiers

preceding the noun, or with qualifiers such as prepositional phrases, appositives, “and relative clauses following the noun

“The big, brown dog chased the cat.”

“My friend, Mary, lives next door.” We saw the girl in the blue dress.”

“I don’t like people who are mean.”

Conjunctions – coordinating (excluding and and then) and

subordinating

Coordinating: but, so, yet

Subordinating: because, before, after, while, until, if, although

Adverbs – all –ly adverbs, including those that are structurally in

error

quickly (quick), loudly (loud), slowly (slow)

Mental/Linguistic verb – verb expressing cognitive and linguistic

processes of humans, animals, or fictional characters

Mental verbs: decided, thought, knew, forgot, wished

Linguistic verbs: said, yelled, called, asked

What is “literate language”?

Decontextualized-meaning is conveyed through specific linguistic devices, primarily grammar and vocabulary.

Present in discourse

Enhances discourse by increasing explicitness and decreasing ambiguity

Oral------------------------Literate

• Frequent use of deictic (this, that, etc.) and nonspecific words (thing, stuff, etc.)

• Assumes shared information, does not talk about what is obvious

• Internal, implicit evaluation (may be conveyed through intonation)

• Inter-clausal connectives limited; clauses are oriented with and, then and prosodic cues

• Use of specific vocabulary

• Does not assume shared information

• External, explicit evaluation (words are used to explain characters’ feelings and behavior)

• Inter-clausal connectives varied and common; clauses are oriented with because, so, therefore

Literate language features (LLFs) include:

•elaborated noun phrases

•adverbs (-ly)

•conjunctions

•mental and linguistic verbs

Elaborated Noun Phrases (ENP)

An ENP is a group of words comprising a noun at its head and modifiers providing additional information about the noun. Can precede the noun or follow the noun.

Modifiers may include articles (e.g., a, an, the), possessives (e.g., my, his, their), demonstratives (e.g., this, that, those), quantifiers (e.g., every, each, some), wh-words (e.g., what, which, whichever), and true adjectives (e.g., tall, long, ugly).

ENPs have been classified as…

• Simple • Pre1 (determiner plus a head noun)• Ex. the dog

• Pre2 (determiner plus adjective or noun modifier)• Ex. the big dog; a farm house

• Complex• Pre 3+ (determiner + two or more adjectives or noun

modifiers)• Ex. these two green frogs

• Post-noun modifying phrases and clauses• Ex. girl with the red bow; girl who was wearing a red

bow

Study findings for ENPs

• The simplest elaborated noun phrases (Pre1) are found in the conversational speech of children as young as 2 years, 6 months and are the most commonly used ENP type for all ages.

• Complex pre-noun modification (Pre3) increased substantially between 5-11 years.

• Post noun modifiers more commonly than complex pre-noun modification.

• Object elaboration is used more frequently than subject elaboration (perhaps due to pronominalization of subjects)

Adverbs

Adverbs serve to modify verbs. These modifiers increase the explicitness of action and event descriptions.

–ly adverbs are most representative of literate language (the –ly suffix may be omitted). These are adverbs of degree and magnitude.

Ex. Carefully; loudly; happily; really

Incorrect forms of –ly adverbs are counted

Conjunctions

Conjunctions are used in discourse to organize information and clarify relationships among elements.

Can be categorized as either

coordinating (e.g., for, or, yet, but, so) or

subordinating (e.g., after, although, as, because, for, if, how, since, still, that, though, unless, when, where, while, why).

Mental and linguistic verbs

Mental verbs refer to various acts of thinking.

Ex. think, know, believe, imagine, feel, consider, suppose, decide, forget, and remember.

Linguistic verbs refer to acts of speaking.

Ex. say, tell, speak, shout, answer, call, reply, and yell.

Some examples…

• …and they finally came to the cave

• there was this big green-looking thing

• they yelled real loud

• they ran away because they were scared

That little girl was really afraid of big dogs

so she didn’t like big dogs because they

scared her her mom took her to the park

and her mom said don’t be afraid it was a

long way to the park suddenly the little girl

heard a barking dog she thought the dog

was going to bite her so she told her mom

she wanted to go home and then they did

Can you identify the LLFs

in the text below?

That little girl was really afraid of big dogs soshe didn’t like big dogs because they scared her her mom took her to the park and her mom said don’t be afraid it was a long way to the park suddenly the little girl heard a barking dog she thought the dog was going to bite her so she told her mom she wanted to go home and then they did

Elaborated Noun PhraseConjunctionAdverbsMental/Linguistic Verb

Why measure literate language?

• To assess the development of language beyond “learning to talk”

•To identify subtle language deficits that will limit literacy and academic success

•To develop intervention planning relevant to the improvement of academic performance

How has literate language been measured?

• In conversation

• In elicited oral narrative discourse (narratives 40- 50 T-units in length are recommended)

• In spontaneous language produced across play centers

To analyze LLF use…

• Perform frequency counts for all literate language features (ENP, -ly Adverbs, Conjunctions, Mental/Linguistic Verbs)

• To compare across samples, control for length by dividing number of literate features by number of T-units or C-units

What do we know about typical literate language development?

• Emerges during the preschool years (Cox, Fang, & Otto, 1997; Dickinson & McCabe, 1991)

• No differences in usage rates between African-American and Caucasian preschoolers (Curenton & Justice, 2004)

• No apparent gender differences (Curenton & Justice, 2004; Greenhaigh & Strong, 2001)

• No differences in children from low versus middle income families (Lemon & McDade, 2012)

What do we know about literate language development? (cont’d)

• There have been conflicting findings with regard to development of LLF type:

• Curenton & Justice (2004) found that the use of conjunctions and mental and linguistic verbs were the most sensitive indicators of age-related changes for preschoolers.

• Alternately, Lemon & McDade (2012) found that elaborated noun phrases and adverbs showed greatest change from age 3-5.

• McGregor (2000) and Shapiro and Hudson (1991), have shown conjunction use to be a particularly sensitive index of increasing language proficiency.

• Greenhalgh & Strong (2001) reported no age-related changes for typical 7-10 year old children but use of conjunctions and elaborated noun phrases most sensitive as indicators of language impairment for this age grouping.

Trends in LLF Research (Eisenberg et al, 2008; Sun & Nippold, 2012)

• Finer analysis of noun phrase elaboration

•Abstract nouns (accomplishment, loneliness, mystery)

• Cognitive verbs (mental verbs- assume, discover, realize)

*Age-related growth in narrative writing was documented for both types of words. Additionally, the use of abstract nouns and metacognitive verbs was associated with the production of complex syntax

What about children with delayed language?

•Children with SLI show significantly deficient LLF use in preschool-age (Paul and Smith, 1993) and school-age narrative contexts (Greenhalgh and Strong, 2001).

•Children who lack linguistic specificity are at risk in the transition to the academic environment.

Literate language intervention in the preschool classroom

• Phillips et al (2016) studied 82 children with low normal language skills randomly assigned to supplemental sessions targeting prepositions, conjunctions, adverbs, and negation or to classroom instruction “as usual”.

• The supplemental instruction included sentence-level and narrative understanding of literate concepts delivered in four, 3-week units, 4 days per week.

• Only the group receiving the supplemental instruction showed significant increase when tested formal standardized testing (CELF-P, CASL, OWLS)

Our collaboration

We had three objectives:

1. To develop and implement a theme-based cycles approach to increasing literate language use in a child development classroom

2. To determine any differences in literate language use across play settings

3. To increase interdisciplinary collaboration skills for students in speech-language pathology and early childhood education

Objective 1-increasing literate language use

•In progress

•Pilot data showed no change over three cycles possibly resulting from • limitations in treatment intensity • inadequate measures of LLF

•Additional study is needed

Objective 2- To determine differences across play centers

Play Centers

Dramatic Play-The dramatic play area contained furniture and materials for cooking and eating, a dress-up area, and a loft area. This center was designed to encourage children to engage in role playing and pretending. It encourages language development, social skill development, conflict resolution, and more.

Art/Science Center- The art center consisted of a table with art activities such as painting, pasting/gluing, and stamping. It was designed to allow a child to express creativity, explore, develop motor skills, practice inventiveness, develop language, and practice decision making.

Sensory Table- The sensory table was a large table with a deep acrylic tub inset. It contained dramatic play toys such as insects, sea creatures, animals, fish, boats, large trucks and diggers, dinosaurs, small toy people, and props, such as cups, pitchers, and spoons. The sensory table was designed to encourage the exploration of textures and physical properties and the acting out of imaginative individual and cooperative play while honing fine motor skills.

0.38

0.4

0.42

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0.46

0.48

0.5

DRAMATIC PLAY ART TABLE SENSORY TABLE

Proportion of LLFs per C-unit for All Participants

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10

20

30

40

50

60

70

PRE1ENP PRE2ENP CENP CONJ ADVERBS M/L

Comparison of LLF Type Across Play Centers

Dramatic Play Art Table Sensory Table

Objective 3- To increase interdisciplinary collaboration skills for students in speech-language pathology and early childhood education

Student Collaboration Questionnaire

1. I can describe the role of a speech-language pathologist in educating young children.

2. I can describe the role of a child development specialist in educating young children.

3. I have a lot to offer in a collaborative relationship with speech-language pathologists.

4. Shared learning with professionals in other fields will increase my understanding of my contributions in my field.

5. I can establish boundaries when working with other professionals.6. I have the knowledge and tools to contribute to a professional collaboration.7. I can describe a successful professional collaboration.8. I can describe an unsuccessful professional collaboration.9. Shared learning with a professional from another field will help me

communicate with professionals.10. I can describe barriers to collaboration.11. I can develop strategies to barriers of collaboration.12. Collaboration is a good way to become familiar with the work of other

professionals.13. Collaborating with other professionals as a student will make me a better

professional after I graduate.

Student Collaboration Questionnaire (Cont.)

14. Interprofessional collaboration improves educational outcomes for young children.15. I highly recommend that all students in the College of Education and Special Studies should be given opportunities to participate in interprofessional collaboration.16. I can explain the importance of play in child development.17. I am knowledgeable about collecting language samples from children.18. I feel confident in my ability to transcribe language samples collected from young children.19. I am knowledgeable about early childhood curriculum.20. I feel confident in designing group lessons for young children.21. I have strategies to develop language in young children through stories and story-based activities.22. I can define and give examples of literate language.23. I can explain the relation of the understanding and use of literate language to success in school.

Building Upon the Research

A Theme-Based, Cycles Approach, Literate Language Curriculum for Early Childhood Classrooms

Purpose

● Makes the ideas and implications of our research tangible for

professionals

● Increase the amount of literate language use by the children

the curriculum is being implemented with

● Intended to be used in a wide array of educational settings

Purpose

● It intends to foster language development and academic

success in atypically developing children.

● Before the creation of our curriculum, there wasn’t a

curriculum available that implements a cycles approach to

teaching literate language to young children.

Curriculum Format

Based on Months of Morphemes

○ Three cycles

○ Four lessons each targeting one of four LLFs

○ Each lesson intended to be implemented twice within each week.

○ Each lesson includes a story/song and an associated activity.

○ Additional stories, songs, and books are included.

Repeat twice

Cycles Approach

Example of Curriculum Development

The Wolf’s Chicken Stew

There once lived a wolf who loved

to eat more than anything else in the

world. He was always thinking about food.

As soon as he finished one

meal, he began to think of the next.

Week 4 Mental/Linguistic Verbs

Look through the book, The Wolf’s Chicken stew. Make a mental note of all mental verbs and linguistic verbs. You can make up additional text that includes these types of verbs.

Group Time: “The Wolf’s Chicken Stew by Keiko Kasza”

Activity: Story

Elicit a story retell using picture sequence cards Prompt with questions containing mental and linguistic verbs.

Ex. What was the wolf always thinking about?What foods did he decide to give the chicken?What did the chicken tell her little chickens to say to Mr. Wolf?

Materials needed: book storyboard picture cards

Selected ReferencesBenson, S. (2009). Understanding literate language: Developmental and Clinical Issues. Contemporary Issues in

Communication Sciences and Disorders, 36, 174-178.

Curenton, S. & Justice, L. (2004) African American and Caucasian preschoolers’ use of decontextextualizedlanguage: Literate language features in oral narratives. Language, Speech, and Hearing Services in Schools, 35, 240-253.

Eisenberg, S., Ukrainetz, T., Hsu, J., Kadaverek, J., Justice, L., & Gillam, R. (2008). Noun phrase elaboration in children’s spoken stories. Language, Speech, Hearing Services in Schools, 39, 145-157.

Greenhaigh, K. & Strong, C. (2001) Literate language features in spoken narratives of children with typical language and children with language Language, Speech, and Hearing Services in Schools, 32, 114-125.

Haskill, A., Tyler, A., & Tolbert, L. (2007). Months of Morphemes: A theme-based cycles approach. Eau Claire: Thinking Publications.

Justice, L. & Ezell, H. (2002) The Syntax Handbook. Eau Claire, WI: Thinking Publications.

Pellegrini, A., Galda, L., Bartini, M., & Charak, D. (1998) Oral language and literacy learning in context: The role of social relationships. Merrill-Palmer Quarterly, 44, 38-54.

Sun, L. & Nipplold, M. (2012). Narrative Writing in Children and Adolescents: Examining the Literate lexicon. Language, Speech, and Hearing Services in Schools, Vol. 43, 2-13.

Westby, C. (1994) The effects of culture on genre structure, and style of oral and written texts. In G. P. Wallach & K.G. Butler (Eds.) Language learning disabilities in school-age children and adolescents (pp. 180-218). New York: Macmillan.