Storytelling Task Research Articles

The impact of children’s lexical and morphosyntactic knowledge on narrative competence development: A prospective cohort study

The authors investigate the contribution of children's early comprehension of relational terms and morphosyntactic knowledge to the development of narrative competence in kindergarten and Grade 1. Narrative competence was assessed through the cohesion, coherence, and structure of children’s productions. The participants in this study were 714 Italian children. The authors measured their oral narrative competence through a storytelling task at the beginning and end of the kindergarten year. A total of 115 children were randomly selected and followed through Grade 1, and their narrative competence was measured again. According to the path analysis model, early morphosyntactic knowledge contributes to explain narrative competence in Grade 1. Early comprehension of relational terms contributes to narrative competence at the end of the school year. These findings confirm the importance of exploring the influence of early language skills on narrative competence development and suggests early intervention at the level of language antecedents of narrative competence.

Narrative discourse in Persian-speaking patients with mild Alzheimer's disease.

ABSTRACT.Despite the significance of discourse impairments, they have not been thoroughly investigated in Persian-speaking patients with Alzheimer’s disease (AD).Objective:the aim of this study was to perform a multi-level analysis of narrative discourse in Persian-speaking patients with mild AD and to compare them with healthy elderly.Methods:the study included 14 older adults with mild AD and a matched group of 14 healthy elderly. Using a storytelling task based on serial pictures, both macro- and micro-linguistic aspects of narrative discourse were assessed. Cohesion ratio and coherence were investigated as macrolinguistic dimensions of discourse. The studied microlinguistic features included syntactic complexity and verbal errors (mostly involving phonological and semantic paraphasias and mazes). Severity of AD was determined using the Cognitive Dementia Rating (CDR).Results:there were significant differences between the groups regarding cohesion ratio (0.9 ± 0.34 vs. 1.29 ± 0.45, p = 0.02) and coherence scores (2.43 ± 0.41 vs. 3.02 ± 0.81, p = 0.03). Verbal errors and syntactic complexity did not differ significantly between the groups.Conclusion:Persian-speaking patients with mild AD show macrolinguistic impairments in producing discourses based on picture description. Therefore, intervention protocols should focus on the ability to organize information on a specific subject and also to connect sentences produced using appropriate cohesive ties.

DEVELOPMENT OF SPEAKING ABILITIES USING INNOVATIVE EDUCATION STRATEGIES: STORYTELLING CASE IN FOREIGN LANGUAGES CLASSROOMS

The article aims to present the storytelling method, which could be applied in teaching/learning foreign languages. Storytelling enables learners to analyse actual topics using the gathered information, to solve problems emphasizing personal experiences and values as well as to listen to other stories and share valuable information. On the one hand, communicative skills are developed through storytelling processes at the same time improving students’ pronunciation, increasing vocabulary, brushing up their grammatical and sentence structure skills. Moreover, young learners’ problem-solving skills are also developed, when they try to remember the received information and answer the questions during the limited time. On the other hand, the use of storytelling method enables teachers to inspire young learners to share their experiences, and to improve their linguistic abilities. The participation in these information sharing activities motivate young learners to be open-minded and encourage them to study individually. The article overviews the importance of the storytelling method on the theoretical level as well as introduces the usefulness of storytelling elements in foreign language classes on the empirical level. The research was planned and performed in X Kaunas Gymnasium, in which the second-grade young learners (average age of the participants was 16 years old) created and presented their stories on the topic “My Festive Day”. The results of the research demonstrate that young learners were more engaged in prepared materials and managed to communicate using new linguistic constructions. What is more, while listening to other presenters they learned about various holiday traditions, different personal attitudes and, consequently, improved their listening, sentence structure and other communicative skills. The participants of the research emphasized that it was interesting for them to prepare storytelling tasks – to write, read the material and to activate the gained information. During the implementation of the storytelling method, a negative aspect related to emotions was observed, and also a lack of stress management and learning to learn skills was determined. DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/sm-2018-0017

IV. CO-CONSTRUCTION OF ATTACHMENT REPRESENTATIONS AND AFFECT-REGULATING COGNITIONS: THE ROLE OF MATERNAL ATTACHMENT SECURITY.

This study focused on the role of maternal co-construction skills in building attachment relevant representations in early childhood. Thirty-four mothers and their 4- to 5-year-old children were presented with two co-construction tasks, one an attachment storytelling task, the other an affect discussion task about emotion-laden situations. Maternal co-construction skills were assessed with several scales that scored the quality of the co-construction partnership, the mother's skill in prompting elaboration, and helping build an explanatory framework. Mothers completed the Attachment Script Assessment (ASA) and the Adult Attachment Interview (AAI) as well. Results indicated that mothers' secure base script knowledge (ASA) was significantly related to communication effectiveness, encouraging elaboration of storylines, and using open-ended and why questions. Maternal AAI coherence showed similar relations to co-construction support.

V. MATERNAL SENSITIVITY AND CO-CONSTRUCTION SKILLS: CONCURRENT AND LONGITUDINAL ASSOCIATIONS WITH PRESCHOOLERS' SECURE BASE BEHAVIOR.

This study investigated the associations among maternal sensitivity, maternal secure base script co-construction skills, and children's secure base behavior during early childhood. Maternal sensitivity and children's secure base behavior were assessed in naturalistic settings among 81 mother-child dyads when the children were approximately 3.5 years old. Maternal co-construction skills were also assessed at that age via a joint mother-child storytelling task. Maternal sensitivity and secure base behavior were assessed again when children (N = 74) were about 5.5 years old. Results indicated that mother sensitivity assessed at the early age was significantly related to maternal co-construction skills. Maternal co-constructive skills in turn were also significantly associated with children's secure base behavior both concurrently and longitudinally. Finally, regression analyses indicated both maternal sensitivity, concurrently at each point in time, and co-construction skills contributed unique and significant information to the prediction of child secure base behavior.

II. MEASURES: SECURE BASE BEHAVIOR, CO-CONSTRUCTION, AND ATTACHMENT SCRIPTS.

In order to examine the interplay between behavioral and cognitive representations of attachment during early childhood, we compiled both behavior-based and more cognitive-based attachment measures for this age range. The behavior-based measures were observational Q-set methodologies already established in the literature. Measures of attachment representations for the children and mothers were narrative-based procedures, that is, established storytelling tasks for obtaining attachment narratives from children and adults. For assessing maternal co-construction processes, we developed two new co-construction tasks that required joint storytelling of attachment relevant storylines in one case, and joint conversations about emotion-laden situations in the other. All of these measures are based on the central secure base construct of attachment theory. Behavioral measures assess secure base use and support. Attachment narratives collected from both children and parents are scored for secure base script knowledge. Maternal co-construction is assessed in terms of cognitive processes that enhance and promote attachment script knowledge.

Development of Speaking Abilities Using Innovative Education Strategies: Storytelling Case in Foreign Languages Classrooms

Summary The article aims to present the storytelling method, which could be applied in teaching/learning foreign languages. Storytelling enables learners to analyse actual topics using the gathered information, to solve problems emphasizing personal experiences and values as well as to listen to other stories and share valuable information. On the one hand, communicative skills are developed through storytelling processes at the same time improving students’ pronunciation, increasing vocabulary, brushing up their grammatical and sentence structure skills. Moreover, young learners’ problem-solving skills are also developed, when they try to remember the received information and answer the questions during the limited time. On the other hand, the use of storytelling method enables teachers to inspire young learners to share their experiences, and to improve their linguistic abilities. The participation in these information sharing activities motivate young learners to be open-minded and encourage them to study individually. The article overviews the importance of the storytelling method on the theoretical level as well as introduces the usefulness of storytelling elements in foreign language classes on the empirical level. The research was planned and performed in X Kaunas Gymnasium, in which the second-grade young learners (average age of the participants was 16 years old) created and presented their stories on the topic “My Festive Day”. The results of the research demonstrate that young learners were more engaged in prepared materials and managed to communicate using new linguistic constructions. What is more, while listening to other presenters they learned about various holiday traditions, different personal attitudes and, consequently, improved their listening, sentence structure and other communicative skills. The participants of the research emphasized that it was interesting for them to prepare storytelling tasks – to write, read the material and to activate the gained information. During the implementation of the storytelling method, a negative aspect related to emotions was observed, and also a lack of stress management and learning to learn skills was determined.

Paracosms: The Imaginary Worlds of Middle Childhood

The invention of imaginary worlds ("paracosms") is a creative activity of middle childhood that has previously been investigated primarily with retrospective adult reports and biographical accounts. In descriptions collected from 8- to 12-year-old children, the prevalence was 16.9% in Study 1 (n=77) and 17.4% in Study 2 (n=92). Children with and without paracosms did not differ in verbal comprehension, divergent thinking (Studies 1 and 2) or working memory (Study 2). However, children with paracosms had more difficulty with inhibitory control (Study 2) and had higher creativity scores on a story-telling task (Studies 1 and 2). Paracosms provided a vehicle for stories associated with imaginary companions and/or for developing complex narratives alone or with friends.

Teasing Apart the Effects of Dominance, Transfer, and Processing in Reference Production by German–Italian Bilingual Adolescents

This paper intends to test different accounts of bilingual reference production against the production of referring expressions in Italian by German‒Italian bilingual adolescents. In particular, we investigate to what extent bilingual referring expressions involve transfer from one language to the other, result from processing and dominance variables, and are the outcome of a process of language change. We will show that each of these hypotheses makes a precise prediction about which referential strategy bilinguals should adopt. The production of referring expressions is examined in the context of a story-telling task. Based on the analysis of overspecified forms, clitic omissions, and agreement mismatches, as well as on correlations with dominance factors, we argue in favor of the relevance of dominance and processing factors for bilingual reference production. Finally, we verify the possibility of generalizing our conclusions to a different linguistic domain, concerning the expression of word order in main clauses.

Children’s Picturebook Goes Digital: Implications on Cognition

The objects of analysis in this article are digital picturebooks, which may be called e-picturebooks. This research contributes to a definition of e-picturebook as a distinct storytelling experience from printed picturebook, introducing distributed cognition as a new theoretical perspective for the analysis of the phenomenon. This perspective emphasizes cognitive systems related to specific features of this category of digital book. In this sense, picturebook and e-picturebook are defined as cognitive artifacts that constrain storytelling tasks very differently from each other, not only because of their constitutive features but also because of the cognitive systems involved in the understanding of stories in each medium.

Exploring media literacy: Enhancing English oral proficiency and autonomy using media technology

Electronic media learning environments afford English language learners more opportunities to use media technology that may require them to attain new media literacy skills. This research examines whether Korean EFL learners’ oral proficiency and autonomy can improve when using media technology. The research involved 62 university students who attended general basic-level English programs. In order to investigate their improvement, this research assessed participants’ speaking development across four digital storytelling tasks and their autonomy and attitudes towards using ICT programs and movie clips via questionnaires during an 8-week period. The participants practiced individual storytelling and created stories using three different ICT programs―Vocaroo, VoiceThread, and TTS―along with their selected movie clips to speak about the given topics in and out of the classroom. The results revealed that participants were able to improve their oral proficiency in terms of discourse based on their critical thinking about the chosen media. They also felt using ICT programs positively affected autonomy development although there was no statistical significance of correlation with their computer proficiency. Overall, participants’ computer skill to utilize media technology was an important factor for oral proficiency development. Additionally, an instructor’s feedback was significant to speaking improvement.

The effect of input on bilingual adolescents’ long-term language outcomes in a foreign language instruction context

The aim of the current study is twofold: to examine the effects of input on bilingual adolescents’ long-term second language (L2) outcomes in a minority/foreign language context; and to understand the interaction between input and other potential predictors of L2 outcomes, specifically environmental variables, learners’ motivation and language learning aptitude. Participants included 97 Mandarin–English bilingual adolescents in Taiwan who learned English as an L2 between the ages of two to eleven. All participants completed a listening comprehension and a story-telling task in English and two standardized language learning aptitude tests. Participants and their parents filled out a detailed questionnaire providing information about family demographics and in-class and out-of-class L2 input. Correlation and multivariate regression analyses revealed that input played an important role in long-term L2 listening comprehension outcome, but not in speech production outcomes. The results also showed that environmental variables and language learning aptitude significantly predicted long-term L2 listening comprehension and speech production outcomes. Finally, out-of-class L2 input outweighed instructional input and current input outweighed early input. Since most previous research on the role of input in long-term L2 outcomes was conducted in a majority/societal language context, the present study contributes to the topic by specifying the effect of input in L2 acquisition in a minority/foreign language context.

How does maternal education influence the linguistic environment supporting bilingual language development in child second language learners of English?

Aims: In monolingual situations, mothers with higher levels of education are more likely to provide their children with enriched linguistic input. However, in bilingual situations, the relationship between maternal education and input is more complex because education may have occurred in one, but not both, of the languages. This study details this complexity by examining the relationship between maternal education and linguistic input in a group of children learning English as a second language (L2). Method: Participants were 89 immigrant/refugee children, living in Canada with diverse first languages (L1s). They completed a story-telling task in their L2 and parent reports provided a measure of L1 development. Parents also answered detailed questionnaires about family demographics and linguistic input within the family. Results: Regression modeling revealed that cumulative exposure to the L2 in school, maternal L2 fluency, relative quantity of L1/L2 use by the mother (input) and by the child (output) all influenced children’s L1 and L2 development. Relative quantity of input and maternal L2 fluency were, in turn, influenced by the amount of education mothers had completed and the language in which that education occurred. In instances where mothers were educated primarily in the L1, higher levels of education were associated with relatively more L1 input. For mothers who were educated predominantly in the L2, higher levels of education were associated with relatively more L2 input. Across both groups, mothers with higher levels of education had higher L2 fluency. Conclusion: This study revealed a complex relationship between the amount of education a mother has, the language in which that education occurred and the linguistic input she provides to her children. This complexity highlights that monolingual studies about input and environment may not offer a sufficiently nuanced perspective to account for the greater levels of variability found in bilingual situations. Originality: Previous research has offered valuable insights into the relationship between individual difference factors and bilingual acquisition. This study moves the field forward through the consideration of the interaction between factors in shaping bilingual acquisition.

Kindergarteners' Narrative Competence Across Tasks and Time

ABSTRACTThe authors investigated children's narrative competence by analyzing the development of the reciprocal relationship between storytelling and story retelling performances over a school year through a cross-lagged panel design. The participants in this study were 170 Italian kindergarten pupils (M age = 4.98 ± 0.31 years). Children were asked to produce oral narratives in two different tasks: a storytelling and a story retelling task. Narrative competence was assessed in terms of structure and coherence. The cross-lagged panel analyses showed that both storytelling and story retelling tasks are stable constructs, but they differ in the emphasis on coherence. Data confirmed the pivotal role played by storytelling as a task, and structure as a component in fostering the development of children's narrative competence. Overall, results from this study suggest that storytelling and story retelling are tasks that involve interrelated but not overlapping processes, and trigger different aspects of narrative competence.

Mothers’ Mental State Talk and Preschool Children’s Social-Behavioral Functioning: A Multidimensional Account

ABSTRACTThis study aimed to investigate the multidimensional nature of maternal mental state talk with respect to children’s social-behavioral functioning in a low-income urban preschool sample. Maternal speech data were collected as mothers narrated a wordless picture book depicting a diverse set of mental states to their children (n = 130, 2–4 year olds). Dimensions of maternal mental state talk (i.e., type, direction, causality) were examined with the Coding System for Mental State Talk in Narratives. Approximately half of the sample consisted of higher-risk children who were identified as in need of clinical services by on-site clinicians. Results indicated that mothers’ diversity and causality of mental state talk, their acknowledgement of characters’ negative emotions, and talk about children’s cognitions and their own mental states were associated with children’s socially adaptive behaviors. On the other hand, mothers’ tendency to focus on children’s perceptions during the story-telling task (e.g., “see that?,” “look!”) was linked with lower social competence and internalizing problems. Mothers in the clinical sample used a significantly lower proportion of emotion words compared to mothers in the nonclinical sample. Results suggest that a picture book reading task might provide a cost-effective method for assessing and possibly modifying maternal mental state talk.

Examining the Oral Communication Strategies Used by a Group of Nepalese Adult Learners in an ESL Context

This paper sought to examine the oral communication strategies (CSs) used by a group of Nepalese adult learners in an oral task in an ESL context. There has been a long history of CS studies in L2 acquisition research; however, there are no studies yet reporting the CSs employed by Nepalese learners in an ESL context. Hence, six Nepalese learners with intermediate language proficiency were engaged in a picture storytelling task . Their narrations were recorded and transcribed, and their responses during the interview were elicited. Four significant results were revealed. Firstly, the Nepalese learners experienced a considerable amount of communication difficulties as manifested by various gap markers. To overcome these problems, the learners simultaneously used a variety of non-verbal CSs alongside verbal CSs. Secondly, linguistic errors were abound in their narrations but were ignored due to their communication goal. Hence, there are areas of communication (e.g., vocabulary and sentence structure) where the learners were having trouble, and these concerns should require instructional attention. Thirdly, the majority of the verbal CSs were avoidance strategies while most of the non-verbal CSs were achievement strategies. Lastly, examining the CSs used by the learners paved the way to culture-based strategies that were employed during storytelling. These CSs provided new inputs to the existing CS frameworks used by English language learners. Implications for language teaching and learning as well as future research are discussed. Keywords: oral communication; communication strategies; gap markers; Nepalese adult learners in an ESL context; culture-based strategies

Sentence production in Parkinson’s disease

ABSTRACTWhile growing evidence reports changes in language use in non-demented individuals with Parkinson’s disease (PD), the presence and nature of the deficits remain largely unclear. Researchers have proposed that dysfunctioning fronto-basal ganglia circuit results in impaired grammatical processes, predicting qualitatively similar language impairments between individuals with PD and agrammatic Broca’s aphasia, whereas others suggest that PD is not associated with language-specific grammatical impairment. In addition, there is a paucity of research examining syntactic production in PD at the sentence-level. This study examined sentence production of individuals with PD, healthy older adults, and individuals with agrammatic Broca’s aphasia. In Experiment 1, using a Cinderella story-telling task, proportion of grammatical sentences, number of embedded clauses and production of verb arguments in sentences were examined. In Experiment 2, a structured sentence elicitation task was used in which syntactic complexity of sentences (canonical vs. non-canonical word order) was systematically manipulated while minimizing demands for non-syntactic processing. Only the participants with agrammatic Broca’s aphasia showed significantly impaired syntactic production in both experiments. Participants with PD did not show impaired syntactic production in either task, despite impairments in lexical retrieval, repetition of words and sentences, and speech production. These findings suggest that impaired syntactic processing may not be a core deficit underlying the changes in language use in non-demented PD. Changes in language use in PD are qualitatively different from language deficits in aphasia.

The Acquisition of Prepositional Meanings in L2 Spanish

This study examines how adult second language learners acquire the different meanings of the Spanish preposition a. Cognitive linguistic models predict that spatial meanings are acquired first, as they are conceptually basic and are the source from which other meanings derive via natural cognitive mechanisms such as metaphor and image-schema transformation (Tyler & Evans, 2003). However, there has been little empirical evidence to support this hypothesis. Results from an oral story-telling task conducted with beginner (N = 10), intermediate (N = 10), and advanced (N = 4) learners suggest that the acquisition of prepositional meanings is not driven solely by cognitive mechanisms, but rather that other non-conceptual factors, such as collocational patterns, cross-linguistic transfer, frequency, and saliency, also play a prominent role. These findings imply that learners approach the multiple varied meanings of a preposition by relying on several different mechanisms simultaneously.

Referential Choices in a Collaborative Storytelling Task: Discourse Stages and Referential Complexity Matter.

During a narrative discourse, accessibility of the referents is rarely fixed once and for all. Rather, each referent varies in accessibility as the discourse unfolds, depending on the presence and prominence of the other referents. This leads the speaker to use various referential expressions to refer to the main protagonists of the story at different moments in the narrative. This study relies on a new, collaborative storytelling in sequence task designed to assess how speakers adjust their referential choices when they refer to different characters at specific discourse stages corresponding to the introduction, maintaining, or shift of the character in focus, in increasingly complex referential contexts. Referential complexity of the stories was manipulated through variations in the number of characters (1 vs. 2) and, for stories in which there were two characters, in their ambiguity in gender (different vs. same gender). Data were coded for the type of reference markers as well as the type of reference content (i.e., the extent of the information provided in the referential expression). Results showed that, beyond the expected effects of discourse stages on reference markers (more indefinite markers at the introduction stage, more pronouns at the maintaining stage, and more definite markers at the shift stage), the number of characters and their ambiguity in gender also modulated speakers' referential choices at specific discourse stages, For the maintaining stage, an effect of the number of characters was observed for the use of pronouns and of definite markers, with more pronouns when there was a single character, sometimes replaced by definite expressions when two characters were present in the story. For the shift stage, an effect of gender ambiguity was specifically noted for the reference content with more specific information provided in the referential expression when there was referential ambiguity. Reference content is an aspect of referential marking that is rarely addressed in a narrative context, yet it revealed a quite flexible referential behavior by the speakers.

A comprehensive and integrated clinical rating for storytelling produced by individuals with traumatic brain injury: A preliminary report

A comprehensive and integrated clinical rating for storytelling produced by individuals with traumatic brain injury: A preliminary report