The effects of a language and literacy intervention on Head Start children and teachers.

Abstract

A language and literacy intervention was implemented in 10 Head Start classrooms. Teachers were trained in specific book reading and conversation strategies. The focus of the intervention was to train teachers how to increase opportunities for language and vocabulary development in young children. At the end of the year, children in the intervention classrooms performed significantly better than children in the control classrooms on the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test-III and the Expressive One-Word Vocabulary Test (3rd ed.). In addition, teachers in the intervention classrooms used strategies that promoted language development during book reading and other classroom activities. Head Start teachers can be trained to implement strategies that have positive effects on children's language and literacy development.

Quality of language and literacy instruction in preschool classrooms serving at-risk pupils

“…It may be that attendance in such workshops increased teachers' use of quality language modeling techniques, but it may also be true that teachers who exhibit high-quality instruction and who are good teachers of language are especially drawn to such workshops. Research provides some guidance concerning what high-quality professional development in the area of language instruction looks like (e.g., Girolametto, Weitzman, & Greenberg, 2003;Wasik et al, 2006), but we have insufficient detail on the workshop experiences of the teachers to draw any firm conclusions regarding this finding. When attempting to predict quality literacy instruction, results showed that teachers who reported a higher sense of self efficacy and held more adult-centered ideas received higher ratings for quality of literacy instruction.…”

“…In these interventions, preschool educators are trained to utilize specific language-facilitation techniques in their formal and informal interactions with children to provide frequent exemplars of language forms and functions that are slightly advanced of (and thus responsive to) children's linguistic abilities. and meal time (e.g., Bunce, 1995;Dickinson, 2006;Girolametto & Weitzman, 2002;Huttenlocher, Vasilyeva, Cymerman, & Levine, 2002;McKeown & Beck, 2006;Wasik et al, 2006), and have been causally associated with accelerated language outcomes in preschool children.The defining characteristics of high-quality literacy instruction in the preschool classroom must be differentiated from the responsive and conversationally-oriented features of highquality language instruction. High-quality literacy instruction features systematic and explicit direct instruction that teaches children about the code-based characteristics of written language, to include both phonological and print structures.…”

“…Numerous descriptive and experimental studies have shown the positive developmental impacts of adult use of welltuned (also called responsive) conversational input to children, particularly the use of openended questions, expansions, advanced linguistic models, and recasts (e.g., Baker & Nelson, 1984;Nelson, 1977;Vasilyeva, Huttenlocher, & Waterfall, 2006;Wasik, Bond, & Hindman, 2006;Yoder, Spruytenburg, Edwards, & Davies, 1995). Social-interactionist theories of language development have informed the design of classroom interventions to accelerate language growth in typical and at-risk children (e.g., Whitehurst & Lonigan, 1998;Vasilyeva et al, 2006;Wasik et al, 2006;Whitehurst et al, 1988). In these interventions, preschool educators are trained to utilize specific language-facilitation techniques in their formal and informal interactions with children to provide frequent exemplars of language forms and functions that are slightly advanced of (and thus responsive to) children's linguistic abilities.…”

“…Coders watched the DVD using iMovie software and entered codes on an electronic implementation checklist connected to an online database. Before coding independently, coders were trained on the implementation checklist using three master coded videotapes and were required to match 80% of the master codes.The checklist comprised nine items, each scored as 1 (present) or 0 (not present), and was similar to other procedural fidelity tools designed to identify the absence or presence of explicitly-defined observable features of implementation for instructional approaches (e.g., Justice & Ezell, 2002;Wasik et al, 2006) and curricula (e.g., Dodge, Colker, & Heroman, 2002). Many procedural fidelity tools are used to identify whether or not key elements of an approach/curriculum are used by a trained interventionist (e.g., teacher), and do not attempt to identify the level or quality of implementation (see Wasik et al, 2006).…”

“…We use the term "procedural fidelity" in this article to reference teachers' procedural skill (see Sun, Merrill, & Peterson, 2001) in implementing a new curriculum, that is, the ability to implement lesson plans as they are intended. In educational research, implementation of manualized curricula or instructional approaches often utilizes measures of procedural fidelity to ensure they are implemented as intended (e.g., Justice & Ezell, 2002;Lonigan, Anthony, Bloomfield, Dyer, & Samwel, 1999; Reid & Lieneman, 2006;Wasik et al, 2006); inclusion of procedural fidelity measures are considered an "essential quality" for intervention research (Gersten et al, 2005), including research on preschool curricula implementation (e.g., Preschool Curriculum Evaluation Research Consortium; see http://pcer.rti.org). Within practice, procedural fidelity measures are increasingly used to determine whether teachers are using adopted programs as intended, particularly those that are considered to be "scientifically based" and for which procedural fidelity might be a key moderator of pupil outcomes (see Glenn, 2006).…”