Limited vocabulary knowledge at 24 and 48 months is uniquely predictive of later school readiness. Young children with low vocabularies require additional supports prior to school entry.

Purpose The purpose of this study was to examine the impact of the home literacy environment (HLE) on the English narrative development of Spanish–English bilingual children from low-income backgrounds. Method Longitudinal data were collected on 81 bilingual children from preschool through 1st grade. English narrative skills were assessed in the fall and spring of each year. Microstructure measures included mean length of utterance in morphemes and number of different words. The Narrative Scoring Scheme (Heilmann, Miller, Nockerts, & Dunaway, 2010) measured macrostructure. Each fall, the children's mothers reported the frequency of literacy activities and number of children's books in the home. Growth curve modeling was used to describe the children's narrative development and the impact of the HLE over time. Results Significant growth occurred for all narrative measures. The HLE did not affect microstructure growth. The frequency with which mothers read to their children had a positive impact on the growth of the children's total Narrative Scoring Scheme scores. Other aspects of the HLE, such as the frequency with which the mothers told stories, did not affect macrostructure development. Conclusions These results provide information about the development of English narrative abilities and demonstrate the importance of frequent book reading for the overall narrative quality of children from Spanish-speaking homes who are learning English.

Purpose: This study examined the impact of maternal depressive symptomatology and social support on the English and Spanish language growth of young bilingual children from low-income backgrounds. It was hypothesized that maternal depression would slow children's development in both languages but that social support would buffer the negative effect. Method: Longitudinal data were collected from 83 mothers of Puerto Rican descent and their children who were attending Head Start preschool for 2 years. The effects of maternal depressive symptomatology and social support from family and friends on receptive vocabulary and oral comprehension development in both languages were examined.Results: Growth curve modeling revealed that maternal depressive symptomatology negatively affected Spanish receptive vocabulary development only. Maternal depression did not affect children's English receptive vocabulary or their oral comprehension in either language. Social support was not related to maternal depressive symptomatology or child language. Conclusions: These findings suggest that maternal depression is 1 risk factor that contributes to less robust primary language development of bilingual children from low-income households. Speech-language pathologists must (a) increase their awareness of maternal depression in order to provide families with appropriate mental health referrals and (b) consider their roles as supportive adults for children whose mothers may be depressed. C hildren of Latino descent are the fastest growing demographic in U.S. public schools (Aud et al., 2012). Many are exposed to Spanish in the home. In fact, 80% of bilingual children enrolled in public school report Spanish to be the primary home language (Kindler, 2002), making Spanish the most common language other than English to which children are exposed (Batlova & McHugh, 2010). The high percentage of Spanish-speaking children in preschool and elementary grades is expected to persist because Spanish is also the principal language of bilingual children attending Head Start preschool programs (Hulsey et al., 2011). Unfortunately, these children are at risk for future academic difficulties.It has been well documented that Latino bilingual children living in the United States underperform their monolingual peers in a variety of academic content areas (Duran & Weffer, 1992;Garcia & Miller, 2008;Reardon & Galindo, 2009). Nationally, Latino children score significantly lower than their English-only classmates on measures of language, literacy, and mathematics as they leave preschool and enter kindergarten (Moiduddin, Aikens, Tarullo, West, & Xue, 2012;Reardon & Galindo, 2009). The stark academic performance difference between these two populations endures throughout their educational experience: Latino students perform lower on measures of math and reading in fourth and eighth grades (Hemphill & Vanneman, 2011) and are more likely to drop out of high school than non-Latino students (Chapman, Laird, Ifill, & KewalRamani, 2011).The educational disadvantage ...

Aims: This study examined associations between mothers’ depressive symptoms and the Turkish heritage vocabulary of their school-age children. We expected that mothers’ depressive symptoms would be associated with lower Turkish vocabulary scores in fourth grade as well as slower growth in vocabulary scores from fourth to sixth grade. Design: We collected longitudinal data on 139 mothers of Turkish origin in Germany and their children in fourth, fifth, and sixth grade. Mothers reported on the level of their depressive symptoms, and children were administered a Turkish receptive vocabulary test. Analysis: Data were analyzed with growth curve modeling. Findings and conclusions: Mothers’ depressive symptoms were not significantly associated with children’s vocabulary in fourth grade. However, mothers’ depressive symptoms did predict slower growth in children’s vocabulary from fourth to sixth grade. The higher a mother’s depressive symptoms score, the slower the growth of her child’s Turkish vocabulary. Originality: To our knowledge, this is the first study to examine the association between mothers’ depressive symptoms and their children’s vocabulary development during the school-age years, and the second to examine it for heritage language development. Significance and implications: Our findings suggest that mothers’ depressive symptoms may be one risk factor limiting parents in successfully passing on the heritage language to their children, even during school-age. Families as well as medical, psychological, and educational professionals should be made aware of the role of mothers’ depressive symptoms in their children’s language development.

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