Reading Beyond the Book: Educating Paraprofessionals to Implement Dialogic Reading for Preschool Children With Language Impairments

We examined how educating paraprofessionals in preschool classrooms on dialogic reading (DR) affected their storybook reading and effects on children’s single word vocabulary. Through a single-case multiple-probe across participants design including four paraprofessionals and eight preschool childre...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Topics in early childhood special education 2020-08, Vol.40 (2), p.68-83
Main Authors: Towson, Jacqueline A., Green, Katherine B., Abarca, Diana L.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Expressive Language
Intervention
Language disorders
Language Impairments
Paraprofessional School Personnel
Paraprofessionals
Preschool Children
Preschool Education
Program Effectiveness
Reading instruction
Reading Strategies
Receptive Language
Staff Development
Teaching assistants
Vocabulary
Vocabulary Development
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Summary:We examined how educating paraprofessionals in preschool classrooms on dialogic reading (DR) affected their storybook reading and effects on children’s single word vocabulary. Through a single-case multiple-probe across participants design including four paraprofessionals and eight preschool children, we identified a functional relation between educating paraprofessionals in DR and implementation of the CROWD prompts; yet, no functional relation was observed for the implementation of the evaluate, expand, and repeat strategies. Data collected on children’s expressive near-transfer vocabulary showed all but one child made minimal gains from baseline to intervention, whereas receptive data remained stable for six participants. Results suggested that paraprofessionals implemented the strategies of DR with variable fidelity following a singular training and in-text supports. Additional supports may be necessary for all aspects of the intervention and generalization to be implemented with fidelity and for improvement to carryover to both receptive and expressive vocabulary skills for children.
ISSN:0271-1214
1538-4845
DOI:10.1177/0271121418821167