Language intervention research in early childhood care and education: A systematic survey of the literature

Walker, Dale; Sepulveda, Samantha J.; Hoff, Erika; Rowe, Meredith L.; Schwartz, Ilene Sharon; Dale, Philip S.; Peterson, Carla A.; Diamond, Karen E.; Goldin‐Meadow, Susan; Levine, Susan C.; Wasik, Barbara H.; Horm, Diane; Bigelow, Kathryn M.

doi:10.1016/j.ecresq.2019.02.010

Cited by 70 publications

(66 citation statements)

References 121 publications

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“…The 30 million word gap concept grew out of Hart and Risley's study (1995), which found that a group of young children in lowincome families heard fewer words than a group of children in middle-class families. More than 25 years old, the study continues to have staying power in education and policy realms and to be cited as a cause for larger "achievement gaps" in low-income children (e.g., Golinkoff et al, 2019;Romeo et al, 2018;Rowe, 2018;Walker et al, 2020). The word gap is mentioned on the websites of the US Department of Health and Human Services and the National Association for the Education of Young Children, and has inspired interventions such as Providence Talks.…”

Section: Word Gapmentioning

confidence: 99%

Dismantling Persistent Deficit Narratives About the Language and Literacy of Culturally and Linguistically Minoritized Children and Youth: Counter-Possibilities

et al. 2021

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Despite decades of efforts, deficit narratives regarding language development and use by children and students from historically marginalized backgrounds remain persistent in the United States. Examining selective literature, we discuss the ideologies that undergird two deficit narratives: the notion that some children have a “word gap” when compared to their White middle-class peers, and students must develop “academic language” to engage in rigorous content learning. The “word gap” concept came from a study wherein a group of young children in low-income families heard fewer words than those in middle-class families. It assumes that language can only be acquired in one way—vocabulary exchange from one parent to one child—and ignores decades of research on diverse pathways for language development. We highlight an alternative perspective that language development builds on children’s experience with cultural practices and the harm on minoritized children by privileging a specific form of vocabulary acquisition. The second deficit narrative concerns “academic language,” a concept championed by scholars aiming to address educational inequity. The construct runs the risk of undervaluing the potential of students from historically marginalized backgrounds to engage in learning using language that is “informal,” nonconventional, or “non-native like.” It also is sometimes used as a rationale to relegate students to special programs isolated from more rigorous academic discourse, thus ironically removing them from opportunities to develop the academic registers they are deemed to be missing. We explore alternative frameworks that shift the focus from linguistic features of academic talk and texts as prerequisites for academic work to the broad range of linguistic resources that students employ for academic purposes in the classroom. Finally, we turn to a positive approach to youths’ language development and use: translanguaging by multilingual learners and their teachers. Translanguaging demonstrates the power of a resource-oriented perspective that values students’ rich communicative repertoires and actively seeks to disrupt language hierarchies. We argue that this approach, however, must be considered in relation to the broader social context to meet its transformative aims. Together, our analysis suggests counter-possibilities to dismantle deficit-oriented narratives and points to promising directions for research and practices to reduce inequity in education.

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Section: Word Gapmentioning

confidence: 99%

Dismantling Persistent Deficit Narratives About the Language and Literacy of Culturally and Linguistically Minoritized Children and Youth: Counter-Possibilities

et al. 2021

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“…With that said, a recent meta-analysis of interventions designed to promote children's language development in early care and education settings found that only 5% included peers in the intervention. 87 Incorporating peers, and providing practitioners and teachers with tools to help them foster positive peer interactions throughout the entire class, is one potential direction for increasing the efficacy of future interventions. For example, working with children to develop positive interaction strategies with peers may have influences on academic development, in addition to increasing their sociability.…”

Section: Implications For Practicementioning

confidence: 99%

The Role of Preschool Peers in Children's Language Development

2021

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Almost 5 million children attend preschool in the United States each year. Recent attention has been paid to the ways in which preschool classrooms shape children's early language development. In this article, we discuss the importance of peers and classroom composition through the lens of age and socioeconomic status and the implications for children's early learning and development. We also discuss the direct and indirect mechanisms through which classroom peers may shape each other's language development. As part of this discussion, we focus on exposure to peer language and engagement with peers, along with teachers' classroom practices. We conclude by discussing the ways in which teachers can ensure that children in classrooms of different compositions reap the maximum benefit, along with implications for research, policy, and practice.

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“…As critical as it is to accurately measure children's language environment, it is also necessary to determine if it is causally related to children's language development, either as a broad construct or as a function of specific interactions (such as adult words or adult-child conversational turns). Although there is a fairly robust literature on interventions designed to improve children's language outcomes (e.g., Cameron & Hutchison, 2009;Fricke, Bowyer-Crane, Haley, Hulme, & Snowling, 2013;Lonigan & Whitehurst, 1998), most language interventions use structured curricula, dialogic reading strategies, or milieu teaching (Walker et al, 2019). Some evidence has shown that it is possible to increase the number of adult words and conversational turns (Leung, Hernandez, & Suskind, 2019;Suskind et al, 2013); however, these studies were not designed to evaluate the causal relation between children's language environment and language development.…”

Section: Beyond Measuring the Word Gapmentioning

confidence: 99%

Language Clearly Matters; Methods Matter Too

Purpura

2019

Child Development

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Over two decades ago, the “30‐million‐word” gap rose to prominence after work by Hart & Risley (1995) suggested that children from families with low socioeconomic status (SES) heard fewer words than their peers from families with higher SES during their first 4 years of life. Recent research challenges the magnitude and even existence of this gap. However, due to methodological limitations, we know very little about the presence, magnitude, and settings in which there may be a word gap. Moreover, causal evidence is also limited. I highlight why it is critical for the field to have a more precise understanding of the nature of the word gap (or lack thereof) and potential avenues for better evaluating this phenomenon.

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Language intervention research in early childhood care and education: A systematic survey of the literature

Cited by 70 publications

References 121 publications

Dismantling Persistent Deficit Narratives About the Language and Literacy of Culturally and Linguistically Minoritized Children and Youth: Counter-Possibilities

Dismantling Persistent Deficit Narratives About the Language and Literacy of Culturally and Linguistically Minoritized Children and Youth: Counter-Possibilities

The Role of Preschool Peers in Children's Language Development

Language Clearly Matters; Methods Matter Too

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