Effects of the strategy therapy ‘lexicon pirate’ on lexical deficits in preschool age: A randomized controlled trial

Abstract

The most common interventions for children with lexical disorders are forms and combinations of interventions focusing on phonological and semantic elaboration and retrieval. Systematic reviews of intervention studies on children with lexical disorders show that a significant generalization of therapeutic effects to untrained vocabulary was rarely achieved. The aim of this study was to investigate whether preschool children with lexical deficits profit from an intervention approach that focuses on implementing lexical learning strategies. A randomized controlled trial was conducted. The control group consisted of 25 children, who received language support in their kindergarten. The 26 children in the experimental group additionally received 15 intervention sessions of the lexical strategy intervention 'lexicon pirate'. Intervention effects were measured using a standardized expressive vocabulary assessment one year after the intervention. All children significantly improved on the expressive vocabulary measure. In addition, the gain in expressive vocabulary size was higher for children in the experimental group than for the participants in the control group. Further analysis revealed that 'lexicon pirate' was as effective for children with qualitative (word-finding) lexical deficits as for those with quantitative (vocabulary) lexical deficits. The gain in expressive vocabulary size was independent of nonverbal IQ, deficits in phonological working memory or other possible influencing factors.

Efficacy of the Lexicon Pirate strategy therapy for improving lexical learning in school-age children: A randomized controlled trial

“…In 2009 and 2010, a large randomized control trial (RCT) was conducted with pre-school-age children to empirically test the effectiveness of the newly developed Lexicon Pirate lexical strategy therapy (Motsch, 2008). The results indicate that in just 13 therapy sessions, Lexicon Pirate can treat lexical disorders in pre-school children more successfully than the classic elaboration approach, especially with regard to long-term effects (up to one year after therapy completion) and generalization to non-targeted words (Motsch and Ulrich, 2012; Ulrich, 2012). An evaluation of the therapy’s effectiveness for school-age children could also prove to be very valuable.…”

“…This hypothesis is corroborated if the effects manifest as a significant improvement over time in standardized expressive vocabulary assessments (WWT 6-10; Glück, 2011). As in the preceding study of Lexicon Pirate (Motsch and Ulrich, 2012), size of expressive vocabulary was chosen as the primary dependent variable to show generalizing effects of the intervention. If the generalization was assessed through receptive vocabulary size, qualitative deficits in the storage of lexical entries could be overlooked since entries – which are often stored incompletely – may be sufficient for the understanding but not for the production of words.…”

“…If the generalization was assessed through receptive vocabulary size, qualitative deficits in the storage of lexical entries could be overlooked since entries – which are often stored incompletely – may be sufficient for the understanding but not for the production of words. ‘The expressive vocabulary is the stronger diagnostic criterion for measuring generalizing effects’ (Motsch and Ulrich, 2012: 162).…”

Zur Bildungsrelevanz semantisch-lexikalischer Störungen

“…Therapeutische Ansätze sind in jüngerer Zeit verschiedentlich beschrieben [1] und hinsichtlich ihrer Wirksamkeit überprüft worden [25][26][27]. Im Setting Unterricht ist insbesondere das Interventionsfeld der Wortschatzerweiterung besser umsetzbar, da hier für das Kind und seine Teilhabechancen wesentliche Themen, samt ihrem Wortschatz angeboten werden.…”

Sprachtherapeutische Intervention bei Kindern mit Sprachentwicklungsstörungen

“…(48). In einer weiteren, methodenvergleichenden Studie mit 82 Probanden stellte sich heraus, dass eine lexikalische Strategietherapie zu stärkeren Generalisierungseffekten führte und nachhaltiger wirkte als eine Elaborations-und Abruftherapie (49).…”