New publication - Multilingualism and speech-language competence in early childhood: Impact on academic and social-emotional outcomes at school

Congratulations to RIPPLE members Professor Sharynne McLeod and Professor Linda Harrison (and their colleagues at the Queensland University of Technology) on their recent publication in Early Childhood Research Quarterly titled:

Multilingualism and speech-language competence in early childhood: Impact on academic and social-emotional outcomes at school

This large-scale longitudinal population study provided a rare opportunity to consider the interface between multilingualism and speech-language competence on children’s academic and social-emotional outcomes and to determine whether differences between groups at 4–5 years persist, deepen, or dis-appear with time and schooling. Four distinct groups were identified from the Kindergarten cohort of the Longitudinal Study of Australian Children (LSAC) (1) English-only + typical speech and language(n = 2012); (2) multilingual + typical speech and language (n = 476); (3) English-only + speech and language concern (n = 643); and (4) multilingual + speech and language concern (n = 109). Two analytic approaches were used to compare these groups. First, a matched case-control design was used to randomly match multilingual children with speech and language concern (group 4, n = 109) to children in groups 1–3 on gender, age, and family socio-economic position in a cross-sectional comparison of vocabulary, school readiness, and behavioral adjustment. Next, analyses were applied to the whole sample to determine longitudinal effects of group membership on teachers’ ratings of literacy, numeracy, and behavioral adjustment at ages 6–7 and 8–9 years. At 4–5 years, multilingual children with speech and language concern did equally well or better than English-only children (with or without speech and language concern) on school readiness tests but performed more poorly on measures of English vocabulary and behavior. At ages 6–7 and 8–9, the early gap between English-only and multilingual children had closed. Multilingualism was not found to contribute to differences in literacy and numeracy outcomes at school; instead, outcomes were more related to concerns about children’s speech and language in early childhood. There were no group differences for socio-emotional outcomes. Early evidence for the combined risks of multilingualism plus speech and language concern was not upheld into the school years.

The full text can be access here:

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0885200615000678

Full citation:

McLeod, S., Harrison, L. J., Whiteford, C., & Walker, S. (2016). Multilingualism and speech-language competence in early childhood: Impact on academic and social-emotional outcomes at school. Early Childhood Research Quarterly, 34, 53-66. doi: 10.1016/j.ecresq.2015.08.005

 

Researching dialogic pedagogies for literacy learning across the primary years

Research Grant Awarded to Christine Edwards-Groves and Christina Davidson

The Primary English Teaching Association Australia (PETAA) is proud to announce that the inaugural 2015 PETAA Research Grant of $75,000 has been awarded to a research team based at Charles Sturt University (CSU) in Wagga Wagga, NSW and lead by Dr Christine Edward-Groves and Dr Christina Davidson. The successful CSU submission is entitled:

Researching dialogic pedagogies for literacy learning across the primary years

This research will study how changes in classroom teacher’s interaction practices will lead to improved opportunities and experiences for students’ oral language and literacy development. In doing so, the project aims to develop and produce a number of shorter and longer-term deliverables to assist classroom teachers understand and enact dialogic pedagogies in their classrooms.

These deliveries include:

·         Production of digital resource – representation of dialogic approaches

·         PETAA Publications: print and digital materials to support the online digital resource

·         Interim reports and a final research report

·         Researchers sharing their research and presenting at PETAA conference/s.

In awarding the Research Grant, The PETAA Research Grant Advisory Group engaged in extensive review and debate in choosing from a strong and highly competitive field. Selecting the successful submission was a close and difficult task. The group, which included internationally acclaimed, leading literacy researchers Professor Peter Freebody and Professor Barbara Comber, felt that classroom talk and its relationship to literacy learning is an area requiring a great deal of attention and has substantial potential as its insights relate to pedagogic relationships.

The project will identify, describe and represent academically enriching teaching of English, oral language and literacy through dialogic pedagogies that support teachers to enact this key aspect of the curriculum. Developing dialogic, explicit and learning focused practices will improve student literacy learning by building substantive knowledge and high level communication skills. Enacting dialogic pedagogies requires understanding classroom talk as pedagogical practice that can be changed to enhance oral language, learner participation and engagement.

The project has two broad aims:

1.       to assist participating teachers develop dialogic pedagogies through critical participatory action research (CPAR) that support students in primary school classrooms to develop oral language through acquiring and communicating knowledge with clarity and a high degree of intellectual focus. Action research is concerned with the development of social practices – in this case, practices of teaching and learning English, oral language and literacy.

2.       to produce digital exemplars of dialogic pedagogies ‘representations of practices’ that may support teachers (both in-service and pre-service) to acquire academically enriching teaching practices.

Classroom teachers from Stages 1, 2 and 3 from primary schools in New South Wales will work with project team members to develop action research studies that examine and develop talk and interaction in lessons. The selected schools offer diverse geographical, cultural and socio-economic variances.

On announcing the successful candidates, PETAA President, Associate Professor Robyn Cox, commented that: The findings of this work funded by teachers to support the development of their own practice based on research findings may well start a new era in evidence based practice in Australian primary schools. The grant further confirms PETAA’s ongoing commitment in support of educational research in the field of literacy; an initiative embedded within PETAA’s Strategic Plan.

The Great Australian Spelling Bee sparks media frenzy for spelling expert Tessa Daffern

The Great Australian Spelling Bee has been a huge hit on Australian TV over the last few weeks, and its popularity has sparked a great deal of media interest in the work of Charles Sturt University PhD student Tessa Daffern. Tessa is a member of the RIPPLE speech, language and literacies strand and has been inundated with media coverage from around the country on the radio, in newspapers and online.

Below is a summary of the online links to Tessa's interviews and media coverage.



‘Researcher raises concern over spelling bee TV show’, Friday 31 July 2015, Education Review
‘Smart kids on Spelling Bee not the norm’, Tuesday 4 August 2015, Yahoo
‘Parents told not to freak out if their kids aren’t as smart as Spelling Bee contestants’, Wednesday 5 August 2015, The Daily Telegraph
‘Parents told not to freak out if their kids aren’t as smart as Spelling Bee contestants’, Wednesday 5 August 2015, news.com.au
‘Parents told not to freak out if their kids aren’t as smart as Spelling Bee contestants’, Wednesday 5 August 2015, The Adelaide Advertiser
‘Parents told not to freak out if their kids aren’t as smart as Spelling Bee contestants’, Wednesday 5 August 2015, Herald Sun
‘Great Australian Spelling Bee: don't buy into the buzz of television show’, Thursday 6 August 2015, Central Western Daily
‘GREAT AUSTRALIAN SPELLING BEE: Don't buy into buzz of television show, says literacy expert’, Thursday 6 August 2015, The Daily Liberal
‘The Morning Grill’, Thursday 6 August 2015, The Wellington Times
‘Australian Spelling Bee should not be taken seriously, says spelling expert’, Thursday 6 August 2015, The Educator
‘Don't buy into spelling bee buzz, expert warns’, Friday 7 August 2015, The Daily Liberal
TBC Early Education Review

In the next few weeks Tessa and her PhD supervisors Noella Mackenzie and Brian Hemmings will head overseas to share her work on an international scale with the following conference presentations:

Daffern, T. (August, 2015). Spelling out assessment: The development and testing of an innovative tool. European Conference for Research on Learning and Instruction, Cyprus.

Daffern, T., & Mackenzie, N. (August, 2015). Does proficiency in spelling, grammar and punctuation predict success in writing? European Conference for Research on Learning and Instruction, Cyprus.

Daffern, T., & Hemmings, B. (September, 2015). Students’ linguistic transitions in spelling between Grades 3 and 6.  European Conference on Educational Research, Budapest, Hungary.

Daffern, T., & Mackenzie, N. (September, 2015). Does Triple Word Form Theory provide a useful framework from which to assess proficiency in spelling? European Conference on Educational Research, Budapest, Hungary. 

  

Congratulations Tessa!!

New publication about the Intelligibility in Context Scale

The following article has been published today:
McLeod, S. & Crowe, K. & Shahaeian, A. (2015). Intelligibility in Context Scale: Normative and validation data for English-speaking preschoolers. Language, Speech, and Hearing Services in Schools, 46(3), 266-276. doi: 10.1044/2015_LSHSS-14-0120

Here is the abstract:

Purpose: To describe normative and validation data on the Intelligibility in Context Scale (ICS, McLeod, Harrison, & McCormack, 2012a) for English-speaking children.

Method: The ICS is a seven item parent report measure of children’s speech intelligibility with a range of communicative partners. Data were collected from the parents of 803 Australian English-speaking children aged 4;0 to 5;5 (37.0% were multilingual).

Results: The mean ICS score was 4.4 (SD = 0.7) of a possible total score of 5. Children’s speech was reported to be most intelligible to their parent, followed by their immediate family, friends, and teachers, and least intelligible to strangers. The ICS had high internal consistency (α = .94). Significant differences in scores were identified based on sex and age, but not socioeconomic status (SES) or the number of languages spoken. There were significant differences in scores between children whose parents had concerns about their child’s speech (M = 3.9) and those who did not (M = 4.6). Sensitivity of .82 and specificity of .58 was established as the optimal cut-off. Test-retest reliability and criterion validity was established for 184 children with speech sound disorder. There was a significant low correlation between the ICS mean score and percentage of phonemes correct (PPC, r =.30), percentage of consonants correct (PCC, r =.24), and percentage of vowels correct (PVC, r =.30) on the Diagnostic Evaluation of Articulation and Phonology (Dodd et al., 2002). Thirty-one parents completed the ICS about English and another language spoken by their child with speech sound disorder. The significant correlations between the scores suggest that the ICS may be robust between languages.

Conclusion: This paper provides normative ICS data for English-speaking children and additional validation of the psychometric properties of the ICS. The robustness of the ICS was suggested since mean ICS scores were not affected by SES, number of languages spoken, or whether the ICS was completed about English or another language. The ICS is recommended as a screening measure of children’s speech intelligibility.