Perceptions of Black Children's Narrative Language: A Mixed-Methods Study

Abstract

Purpose In this mixed-methods study, we address two aims. First, we examine the impact of language variation on the ratings of children's narrative language. Second, we identify participants' ideologies related to narrative language and language variation. Method Forty adults listened to and rated six Black second-grade children on the quality of 12 narratives (six fictional, six personal). Adults then completed a quantitative survey and participated in a qualitative interview. Results Findings indicated that adults rated students with less variation from mainstream American English (MAE) more highly than students with greater variation from MAE for fictional narratives, but not for personal narratives. Personal narratives tended to be evaluated more favorably by parents than teachers. Black raters tended to assign higher ratings of narrative quality than did White raters. Thematic analysis and conversation analysis of qualitative interviews supported quantitative findings and provided pertinent information about participants' beliefs. Conclusion Taken together, quantitative and qualitative results point to a shared language ideology among adult raters of variation from MAE being more acceptable in informal contexts, such as telling a story of personal experience, and less acceptable in more formal contexts, such as narrating a fictional story prompted by a picture sequence.

Doing Assessment: A Multicase Study of Preschool Teachers’ Language and Literacy Data Practices

“…These patterns did not appear in our data, but we did not ask teachers directly about these experiences, so this may not have emerged in their responses. Additionally, given the evidence in the literature of potential biases in teacher judgments based on the cultural and linguistic diversity of both children and teachers (Gardner‐Neblett & Ebright, 2021; Mills, Moore, Chang, Kim, & Frick, 2021; Südkamp et al, 2012; Urhahne & Wijnia, 2021), this merits further investigation in understanding teachers’ data practices.…”

Forum: Serving African American English Speakers in Schools Through Interprofessional Education & Practice

“…Through two clinical focus articles, readers will recognize how AAE develops during the preschool years and is expressed across various linguistic contexts and elicitation tasks (Newkirk-Turner & Green, 2021) and identify markers of developmental language disorder within AAE from language samples analyzed in Computerized Language Analysis (Overton et al, 2021). Seven empirical articles employ such designs as quantitative (Byrd & Brown, 2021;Diehm & Hendricks, 2021;Hendricks & Jimenez, 2021;Maher et al, 2021;Mahurin-Smith et al, 2021), qualitative (Hamilton & DeThorne, 2021), and mixed methods (Mills et al, 2021). These articles will help readers identify ways in which AAE affects how teachers view its speakers' language skills and communicative practices and relates to its speakers' literacy outcomes.…”

“…Using the IPE/IPP as a framework, this forum offers a set of articles from scholars in Communication Sciences and Disorders, education, and linguistics to guide schoolbased practitioners and stakeholders through the following: (a) appraising verbal and nonverbal abilities in AAE-speaking children, (b) assessing knowledge of language and its variation in teachers and parents of AAE-speaking children, and (c) instructing AAE speakers to communicate and read within a culturally-relevant pedagogy in which language ideologies are interrogated. Although most of the articles in this forum focus on collaboration between SLPs and teachers, a few include ideas for how to involve in IPE/IPP school administrators (Byrd & Brown, 2021;Hamilton & DeThorne, 2021) and parents of AAE-speaking children (Mills et al, 2021;Newkirk-Turner & Green, 2021).…”

“…In terms of research methodology, articles in this forum present data on the language and literacy performance of AAE speakers in preschool through Grade 5. This forum expands the quantitative repertoire of research in child language with studies that are ethnographic (Hamilton & DeThorne, 2021) and mixed methods (Mills et al, 2021). Qualitative methodologies offer a way to understand how individuals express and make sense of communicative variation.…”

“…For example, through participant observation, Hamilton and DeThorne (2021) provide a nuanced description of how the nonverbal communication of their focal child-a Black male kindergartner-was interpreted and acted upon by his teacher in ways that positioned him as a behavior problem in the classroom. Through in-depth interviews, Mills et al (2021) elevate voices of adults who regularly assess child language, both informally and formallyparents and teachers of second-grade Black children. Findings from Mills et al suggest opportunities for IPE/IPP among teachers, parents, and researchers: Insights from schoolbased practitioners and stakeholders can inform how researchers develop culturally-fair assessments of narrative language.…”