The purpose of this study was to investigate whether professional development enhanced educators' use of conversational strategies during shared book reading with small groups of preschoolers. Twenty preschool educators and small groups of children from each of their classrooms were randomly assigned to the experimental or control group. The 10 educators in the experimental group received instruction in shared book reading strategies as well as individual classroom coaching sessions. Each educator was video-recorded reading two storybooks to a small group of preschoolers at pretest and posttest. The video-recordings were transcribed and coded to yield the measures of the book-related talk. The findings revealed that the educators in the experimental group used a greater number of open questions, responsive statements and different words compared to the control group. The educators and children in the experimental group also maintained longer book-related conversations and had more conversations that were five or more turns in length compared to the control group. These findings suggest that professional development that includes group instruction

https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.5154220.

Aims and objectives: The objective of this study was to examine the narrative ability of two subgroups of English Language Learners (ELLs) relative to a group of English monolingual (EL1) peers. Specifically, we investigated whether the three groups of children differed on measures of narrative macrostructure and microstructure. Methodology: Two groups of ELLs were identified on the basis of parent report of the language most often heard and spoken at home (ELL English language users, ELL minority language users). A group of monolingual English children served as a comparison group ( n = 25 per language group). The children averaged 56 months of age. All children completed a narrative retell task. Data and analysis: The retell task was scored in relation to macrostructure (narrative information) and microstructure (number of utterances, mean length of utterance, number of different words, grammaticality). ANCOVAs, partialling out age and memory, revealed distinct performance profiles for the two ELL groups. Findings: There were no group differences on the number of utterances or story grammar. However, the performance of the ELL minority language group was significantly different from that of the EL1 and the ELL English language group on all microstructure measures (number of different words, sentence length, and grammaticality). Overall, the performance of the ELL English language users was indistinguishable from the EL1 group. Originality: The study highlights the heterogeneity in an ELL kindergarten sample with respect to English narrative ability, based on the extent to which English was heard and spoken at home. Implications: The findings highlight the need to gather detailed linguistic information about the home language environments of ELL children when involving them in language- or literacy-related tasks. An important implication of this information is the potential to lead to more nuanced expectations or teaching methods for subgroups of ELL children.

Recent research examining children's early mathematical abilities has focused primarily on number and operations (e.g., counting, addition) with considerably less attention directed to the role of other possible dimensions of early mathematical abilities, such as, measurement, geometry, and patterning. The current study examined the dimensionality of informal mathematical abilities by conducting categorical confirmatory factor analysis (CCFA) using data from a large sample of preschool children from low-income families (N=1630; Mean age = 4.46 years, SD = .37) using the Child Math Assessment (CMA; . The best fitting model consisted of four factors of Number and Operations, Measurement, Geometry, and Patterning, with the Number and Operations factor explaining common variance in three first-order factors of Numbering, Operations, and Relations. These findings support the view that informal mathematical knowledge is a multi-dimensional construct comprised of each of these separable dimensions. Additionally, a Multiple Indicators Multiple Causes model was used to determine if mathematical ability differed for male and female preschoolers on each of the four factors or on each of the 35 items of the CMA. Results showed no differences for mathematical abilities between males and females at this age. Future research and curricular implications are discussed.

This study examines the relationship between complex oral language and phonological awareness in the preschool years. Specifically, the authors investigate the relationship between concurrent measures of oral narrative structure (based on measures of both story retell and generation), and measures of blending and elision in a sample of 89 children between 4 and 6 years of age. A hierarchical linear regression was conducted to determine whether oral narrative structure explained unique variance in skill in