Oral Language Research Articles

Student-generated questions: An exploration of an instructional strategy with young children

Student-generated questions enhance deeper learning and empower active participation and critical thinking. Researchers have extensively explored teacher questions, but a notable gap persists in how to teach young children to ask questions effectively. This mixed-methods pilot study examined the impact of teaching questioning skills using the Question Formulation Technique (QFT) in an early childhood summer program for children from under-resourced areas. Pre-post oral language assessment scores from 33 children were analyzed to determine the impact of the QFT. Results reveal that using this method, teachers can effectively guide young students to ask more and better questions. Students involved in the research exhibited a substantial increase in the number of questions posed. They demonstrated a qualitative improvement in their approach to questioning, significantly increasing the number of wonderment questions (high-level questions). Conclusions indicate that using the QFT in early childhood classrooms can encourage young children to generate questions. Based on these findings, the authors conclude that teaching learners to ask meaningful questions can enhance their engagement, comprehension, and overall academic performance in diverse populations.

The Impact of Story: One Preschool Program’s Experiences Using Story Cubes as a Culturally Relevant Oral Language Strategy.

The Impact of Story: One Preschool Program’s Experiences Using Story Cubes as a Culturally Relevant Oral Language Strategy.

IRB Consent Guidelines: Potential Barriers to Diversity in Research.

Despite initiatives aimed at improving study participation and inclusion among ethnic and racially minoritized and marginalized populations, participation remains low. While necessary to ensure ethical practice in human participant research, certain Institutional Review Board (IRB) guidelines may introduce additional barriers in research involving these populations. This work outlines guidelines pertaining to consent translation for non-English speaking populations and offers discussion on a greater emphasis for more inclusive methods for marginalized communities. The University of Wisconsin's IRB approved alternative oral consent processes after the community partner determined that standard translation processes would be inefficient. Researchers used translated consent materials for four different ethnic groups (Hmong, Karen, Karenni, and Burmese). We provided recorded consents in each respective language to participants before study participation and obtained verbal consent prior to study participation at the study location. We experienced time and resource constraints in both access to translators and the consent-translation process itself. Furthermore, many participants were unable to read in their native language making standard written consent processes both difficult and impractical. Oral discussion and verbal consent processes were efficient. Adjustments to consent-related guidelines may prevent and eliminate time and resource-related barriers in consent processes. In eliminating such barriers, subsequent improved efficiency in both study design and study promotion areas can work to better promote diversity in research among populations that emphasize oral language and in instances where literacy rates in written non-English language may be lower.

Speech-language performance and comorbid disorders in children with perisylvian syndrome induced by viral encephalitis.

Viral encephalitis is one of the main causes of the perisylvian syndrome, which can cause damage to children's language-speech, feeding, and swallowing functions. Comprehensive assessment of language-speech and swallowing function and comorbidity research on these children will help children's rehabilitation workers to better understand the disease and strengthen the systematic management of comorbid disorders. To describe speech and language pathology and the occurrence of comorbid disorders in children with perisylvian syndrome induced by viral encephalitis. Twenty-two children with acquired perisylvian syndrome were recruited in this study. Language and speech functions, including oral motor function, swallowing function, language ability, and dysarthria were assessed in these patients. Craniocerebral magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), electroencephalogram examination, and intelligence evaluation were performed to determine brain lesions and comorbid disorders. All children exhibited different degrees of oral movement, dysphagia, and speech and language disorders. There was a significant difference between expressive and receptive language ability (P<0.05). There were 10, 8, and 12 children who had an intellectual disability, limb disability, and epilepsy, respectively. In addition to the damage of the peri-tegmental cortex found in MRI, thalamus lesions occurred in 19 cases and white matter involvement in six cases. Children with acquired perisylvian syndrome caused by viral encephalitis are characterized by persistent pseudobulbar dysfunction, speech and language impairment, and orofacial diplegia. They have a high probability of secondary epilepsy and are prone to motor and cognitive impairment, which need systematic management.

Educational practices for the language development of students with intellectual developmental disorder in the school setting: a systematic review

BackgroundIntellectual development disorder (IDD) is a challenging disorder that professionals, most notably teachers, are confronted with daily. Supporting oral language in the classroom is a complex challenge as teachers are expected to implement effective methods to support students’ language. However, they face a persistent scarcity of scientific evidence to draw upon in their practice.AimsThis research provides a first overview of instructional methods and their effectiveness in this population.MethodOur search was conducted through various databases, generating a total of 931 articles. Data from the 14 selected studies were analyzed.Outcomes and resultsThe results reveal limited, heterogenous, and hardly comparable studies in terms of their characteristics (samples, language area, strategies, and effectiveness measures) suggesting a low level of evidence regarding the effectiveness of these practices.Conclusion and implicationsWe discuss the implications of these findings in light of the different factors contributing to the interventions’ effectiveness, as well as considering the issue of transfer and generalization of acquired skills in IDD. We also reveal the urgent need for developing methods addressing cognitive load limitations such as implicit learning approaches, to enhances effectiveness and compensate the gap of available resources tailored to improve oral language outcomes in the IDD population.

The Effect of Word Decoding and Oral Language Skills on the Written Composition of Short Narratives

Purpose: This study examined the effect of decoding and oral language skills on the written composition of short narratives among first-grade children at the end of the academic year.Methods: A total of 55 first graders participated in the study. To qualify for the study, participants were required to score at or above 80 on a nonverbal intelligence test. All participants were administered assessment of written composition, word decoding, receptive vocabulary, semantic relation vocabulary, and sentence comprehension. Pearson correlation and multiple stepwise regression were conducted.Results: The results showed the written composition of short narratives was significantly correlated with word decoding, receptive vocabulary, semantic relation vocabulary, and sentence comprehension. In the multiple stepwise regression, word decoding and receptive vocabulary predicted a significant amount of variance in the written composition of short narratives.Conclusion: These findings demonstrated that word decoding and vocabulary knowledge have a significant effect on written composition of short narratives in the early stage of writing development. Word decoding and vocabulary should be considered for assessment and intervention for children in the early stage of writing.

Review of Research on Motivation and EFL Students' Speaking Performance

In the context of global integration, English learning has become a more important topic, especially in developing speaking skills, which plays a vital role in cross-cultural communication. Motivation, as a psychological element that boosts individuals actions, has a significant impact on improving EFL students speaking competence. The study focuses on motivation and its influence on EFL students oral performance, aiming to explore how to improve students oral ability with motivational strategies effectively. In terms of methods, this study uses literature analysis, including literature review, theoretical analysis and empirical research. Based on the review of existing literature, the challenges posed by low motivation and self-regulation ability to EFL learners oral language development are identified. At the same time, this paper introduces the L2 motivational strategy, self-determination theory and Kellers ARCS motivation strategy theory and explores how these theories are applied in the real pedagogical context. The results show that intrinsic motivation positively correlates with students autonomous learning ability, teacher support autonomy and classroom participation. Moreover, self-determination motivation can effectively reduce spoken English anxiety and improve spoken English ability. Based on the result, this study points out the key role of motivational strategies in teaching and provides practical guidance for teachers to improve EFL students oral performance.

Not just phonology: a longitudinal study of dyslexia subtypes based on the distinction between reading accuracy and reading rate

IntroductionPrevious cross-sectional investigations by Shany and colleagues have provided evidence of double dissociation among dyslexics between word reading accuracy and (pure) word reading rate. A rate-disabled subtype (with intact reading accuracy) evinced deficits only in rapid naming (RAN); An accuracy-disabled subtype (with intact reading rate) showed deficits in phonological awareness (PA) and morphological awareness (MA) but not RAN.MethodThe present longitudinal study followed 639 Palestinian Arabic-speaking children from preschool to Grade 1 with the aim of determining (1) whether a dissociation between PA C MA and RAN is apparent among pre-literate preschoolers, (2) whether the PA C MA-disabled subgroup constitutes a mild form of Developmental Language Disorder (DLD), (3) whether our three disabled subgroups (PA C MA-only, RAN-only, and PA C MA-plus-RAN) can be differentiated on preschool early literacy measures and, (4) whether the three at-risk subgroups develop into selectively rate-disabled, accuracy-disabled, or doubly-disabled (accuracy C rate) readers in Grade 1?ResultsOur findings confirmed the existence of two distinct selectively disabled/at-risk subgroups in preschool: a RAN-only subgroup with intact PA and MA and a PA C MA subgroup with broad impairments across language measures but intact RAN. Grade 1 reading data also confirmed that the RAN-disabled subgroup became slow but accurate readers, whereas the PA C MA subgroup developed into inaccurate and slow readers.DiscussionOur study indicates partial dissociation between early dyslexia subtypes, each displaying distinct and non-overlapping cognitive-linguistic profiles in preschool. The study also revealed a strong association between reading accuracy and reading rate among beginning readers. This study emphasizes the importance of considering heterogeneity in reading outcomes as well as multiple oral language skills beyond the well-documented role of PA.

The Value of Digital Narrative in Oral Second Language Teaching

Digital Narrative has long been formed, developed and mature in foreign countries, but the domestic attention to it is still less, the lack of a complete theoretical system and practical model, so it is rarely used in classroom practice. As the product of the combination of digital information technology and traditional narrative, Digital Narrative is derived from video teaching. The initial form of Digital Narrative is relatively simple, based on the cognitive theory of multimedia learning and the theory of multiple literacy. In practice, Digital Narrative can be mediated by extra-curricular activities, network platforms, and theme competitions, which is of great value in oral second language teaching due to its unique advantages of novelty, diversity and situationality.

What difficulties do children learning English in addition to another language experience with English oral language? A systematic review

ABSTRACT Within the majority of English-speaking settings, children learning English as an additional language (CLEAL) underperform academically relative to their monolingual, English-speaking peers. This systematic review (preregistration: https://archive.org/details/osf-registrations-zgmha-v1) identifies the elements of the English oral language where these children experience difficulty. We focused on research measuring an English oral language outcome for CLEAL between the ages of 3 and 7 and their age-matched, monolingual English-speaking peers. We searched PsycINFO, Web of Science, British Education Index and Linguistics and Language Behaviour s, for studies published between 2015 and 2024, written in English. Of the 2125 records identified, 20 were eligible for inclusion, with a low-to-moderate risk of bias. Overall, our target group performed significantly worse in tests of English receptive and expressive vocabulary, syntactic knowledge, listening comprehension, embedding, collocational knowledge and areas of narrative skill and phonological production. However, these children were comparable with their peers in other areas of narrative skill, lexical and pragmatic understanding, elements of morphological production and areas of phonological production and processing. Overall, while the picture is mixed, highlighting the need for further study of oral English in CLEAL, this review strengthens existing arguments for vocabulary and syntax acquisition as appropriate targets for intervention.

Acoustic behavioral observation in study abroad research: A case study using the Electronically Activated Recorder (EAR)

Frequency of (aural) language exposure and productive (oral) language use, context, and interlocutors are important factors for language learning. Applied linguists and study abroad (SA) researchers have studied these variables mostly retrospectively through questionnaires and learners’ self-reports which have unknown correspondence with learner's actual language use and social networks. Surprisingly few applied linguists have attempted to capture quantitative aspects of day-to-day language use through systematic long-term observation even though methods to do so have been used in psychological science for some time. In this article, we present arguments for the application of acoustic behavioral observation in applied linguistics and SA research. We introduce the Electronically Activated Recorder (EAR; Mehl, 2017) and illustrate its application in a case study about the use of first, second, and additional languages by two German high school students during their year abroad in the USA. The EAR is a digital audio recorder, currently available as an app for Android devices. It can be installed on smartphones worn by their users as they go about their daily activities. The app intermittently (e.g., 5 times per hour) records brief (e.g., 30 s) snippets of ambient sounds from the wearer's moment-to-moment sonic environment. EAR users are unaware of when exactly the device is recording. We describe the method, data collection, transcription, coding and analyses, address ethical concerns about its application, and report findings from the case study about the SA students’ language use to illustrate the potential and limitations of the method for applied linguistics research.

The Impact of COVID-19 on ‘Spanish-Speaking’ Children’s Phonological Development

Communication and social interaction have been limited during the COVID-19 pandemic. The aim of this study was to check if 3-, 4-, and 5-year-old children manifest alterations in oral language according to their stage of language development. To carry it out, the Induced Phonological Register developed by Monfort and Juárez was applied to analyze 150 participants (77 boys and 73 girls) with an average age of 4 years and 6 months. Children who experienced the COVID-19 pandemic for an extended period show a delay in the acquisition of some phonemes compared to children who undergo typical phonological development as specified by Laura Bosch (2003) regarding language development for Spanish children. Likewise, they present a higher number of erroneous words and phonemes than expected for their age.

Effects of tier 1 content literacy intervention on early-grade English learners’ reading and writing: Exploring the mediating roles of domain-specific vocabulary and oral language proficiency.

Effects of tier 1 content literacy intervention on early-grade English learners’ reading and writing: Exploring the mediating roles of domain-specific vocabulary and oral language proficiency.

Dialogic reading in preschool: a pragmatic randomized trial enrolling additional language learners

Additional language learners are at risk of presenting lower language skills in the majority language compared to peers. These differences in language skills have been observed at an early stage of education and may impact academic achievement later on. A randomized trial with a switching replications design was performed in Swedish preschools to examine the effectiveness of small group dialogic reading, aiming to promote oral language skills. The sample comprised 85 children with diverse language, socioeconomic, and cultural backgrounds attending nine preschools in three school districts. Dialogic reading was conducted by ten teachers, trained in dialogic reading and coached by three special education teachers. The dialogic reading intervention was feasible in preschool context and children progressed in their oral language skills during the intervention.

Attainment of Course Learning Outcome using Awakening to Languages Approach among Hotel Management Students in Malaysia

The Awakening to Languages (ATL) approach has seen positive outcomes in foreign language classes. However, research on the approach in the Malaysian context is scarce, especially among university students. Hence, this study analyses the approach’s effectiveness after it has been implemented, through descriptive analysis, specifically regarding the attainment of one of the course learning outcomes (CLO), simulation, for a third language course in a Malaysian university. The result indicates that the marks achieved by all classes for their CLO 1 were highly satisfactory. This suggests a positive correlation between this approach and oral language skills. Keywords: ;

Supplemental Material for Effects of Tier 1 Content Literacy Intervention on Early-Grade English Learners’ Reading and Writing: Exploring the Mediating Roles of Domain-Specific Vocabulary and Oral Language Proficiency

Supplemental Material for Effects of Tier 1 Content Literacy Intervention on Early-Grade English Learners’ Reading and Writing: Exploring the Mediating Roles of Domain-Specific Vocabulary and Oral Language Proficiency

Formations of new knowledge in doctoral supervision and examination in Australia: a preliminary investigation of the adequacy of the written thesis

ABSTRACT This small-scale research has drawn on the experience of six senior academics who have been involved in extensive doctoral supervision and examinations. The aim of the article is to discuss the nature of doctoral supervision and examination, and suggest views to enhance the expression of research outcomes as new knowledge or re-interpreting of existing ideas, theories and approaches. An interpretive view of knowledge involving critical inquiry into qualitative interview data guides the research methodology. Main points arising from semi-structured interviews form the basis of five theorised themes. Analysis of transcribed interview responses has identified trends, commonalities and differences, and has enabled the theorising of themes from Habermasian and Freireian perspectives of praxis, dialogue, critique and critical awareness. Implications for a critical, dialogical, philosophical thesis are posed, where systematic oral language strengthens written understanding.

Neurocognitive outcomes in young adults with cochlear implants: The role of early language access and crossmodal plasticity

Many children with profound hearing loss have received cochlear implants (CI) to help restore some sense of hearing. There is, however, limited research on long-term neurocognitive outcomes in young adults who have grown up hearing through a CI. This study compared the cognitive outcomes of early-implanted (n = 20) and late-implanted (n = 21) young adult CI users, and typically hearing (TH) controls (n=56), all of whom were enrolled in college. Cognitive fluidity, nonverbal intelligence, and American Sign Language (ASL) comprehension were assessed, revealing no significant differences in cognition and nonverbal intelligence between the early and late-implanted groups. However, there was a difference in ASL comprehension, with the late-implanted group having significantly higher ASL comprehension. Although young adult CI users showed significantly lower scores in a working memory and processing speed task than TH age-matched controls, there were no significant differences in tasks involving executive function shifting, inhibitory control, and episodic memory between young adult CI and young adult TH participants. In an exploratory analysis of a subset of CI participants (n = 17) in whom we were able to examine crossmodal plasticity, we saw greater evidence of crossmodal recruitment from the visual system in late-implanted compared with early-implanted CI young adults. However, cortical visual evoked potential latency biomarkers of crossmodal plasticity were not correlated with cognitive measures or ASL comprehension. The results suggest that in the late-implanted CI users, early access to sign language may have served as a scaffold for appropriate cognitive development, while in the early-implanted group early access to oral language benefited cognitive development. Furthermore, our results suggest that the persistence of crossmodal neuroplasticity into adulthood does not necessarily impact cognitive development. In conclusion, early access to language – spoken or signed – may be important for cognitive development, with no observable effect of crossmodal plasticity on cognitive outcomes.

STUDY THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE COGNITIVE ASPECT OF THEORY OF MIND AND UNDERSTANDING IN ORAL LANGUAGE IN ALZHEIMER'S PATIENTS DURING THE MIDDLE STAGE OF THE DISEASE

The ability to infer internal mental states through the behavior is related to the understanding of implicit language statements in interactive situations where the speaker’s intention is public.This study looked at that relationship by answering whether this association persists during aging and after Alzheimer’s. Apply some of the terms of the Theory of mind (Toma) battery and the Oral Language (OLTA) battery designed for the adult. A group of5 individuals with Alzheimer's disease during the middle stage. The results found that the impact relationship is not limited to the group of individuals below the age of maturity, but continues into old age. it would explain the nature of language and cognitive disorders in understanding metaphors such as folk proverbs and the attribution of mental states either through behavior or through language in intermediate Alzheimer’s patients. Keywords:Cognitive side, theory of mind, understanding, oral language, Alzheimer's.

Longitudinal trajectories of brain development from infancy to school age and their relationship to literacy development.

Reading is one of the most complex skills that we utilize daily, and it involves the early development and interaction of various lower-level subskills, including phonological processing and oral language. These subskills recruit brain structures, which begin to develop long before the skill manifests and exhibit rapid development during infancy. However, how longitudinal trajectories of early brain development in these structures supports long-term acquisition of literacy subskills and subsequent reading is unclear. Children underwent structural and diffusion MRI scanning at multiple timepoints between infancy and second grade and were tested for literacy subskills in preschool and decoding and word reading in early elementary school. We developed and implemented a reproducible pipeline to generate longitudinal trajectories of early brain development to examine associations between these trajectories and literacy (sub)skills. Furthermore, we examined whether familial risk of reading difficulty and a child's home literacy environment, two common literacy-related covariates, influenced those trajectories. Results showed that individual differences in curve features (e.g., intercepts and slopes) for longitudinal trajectories of volumetric, surface-based, and white matter organization measures in left-hemispheric reading-related regions and tracts were linked directly to phonological processing and indirectly to second-grade decoding and word reading skills via phonological processing. Altogether, these findings suggest that the brain bases of phonological processing, previously identified as the strongest behavioral predictor of reading and decoding skills, may already begin to develop early in infancy but undergo further refinement between birth and preschool. The present study underscores the importance of considering academic skill acquisition from the very beginning of life.