Effects of a Pragmatic Teaching Strategy for Requesting Information by Communication Board Users

Abstract

The effects of a pragmatic teaching strategy on 4 nonspeaking children's abilities to initiate requests for information (i.e., who, what, and where) using manual communication boards were investigated. A teaching strategy based on milieu teaching and time-delay procedures was developed and embedded in naturally structured communication tasks to evoke information requests. Results indicated that information requests using the communication board occurred only after the pragmatic teaching strategy was applied sequentially to the three request types during the experimental condition. This effect was demonstrated repeatedly across the 4 subjects. Although generalization across request types was not demonstrated, substantial generalization was found across partners and environments. A social validation measure confirmed the treatment effectiveness. Independent raters perceived significant differences when viewing before- and after-training videotapes on 7 of 10 communication variables for all subjects.

Integrating Research on Effective Instruction With Instruction in the Natural Environment for Young Children With Disabilities

“…That is, some children may experience great success, whereas others experience less success. In some studies, a number of the children showed dramatic increases in their use of specific language skills, whereas other children in the same study showed minimal or no effects (Angelo & Goldstein, 1990;Cavallaro & Poulson, 1985;Hart & Risley, 1968, 1974,1975Losardo & Bricker, 1994;McLean & Vincent, 1984;Rogers-Warren &Warren, 1980;Warren, 1992;Warren & Gazdag, 1990). Hart and Risley (1968, 1974,1975 conducted a series of studies to examine the effects of incidental teaching procedures on children's specific language skills.…”

“…In other studies (Angelo & Goldstein, 1990;Carnarata, 1993;Losardo & Bricker, 1994), children were either taught or screened for critical prerequisite skills prior to beginning the study. However, these skills were not reviewed prior to each instructional session.…”

“…However, in none of the studies were these setting contexts used to review previously learned material and to reinforce children for instructional interactions prior to presenting more demanding response situations. Angelo and Goldstein (1990) examined the effects of instruction in the natural environment (i.e., getting children interested in material, waiting for children to respond, providing access to material for correct responses, or providing help using a least-to-most assistance sequence for incorrect responses) on children's requests for information (i.e., who, what, and where). Prior to beginning instruction on the target skill, the participants were taught to identify the request symbols on their individual communication boards.…”

“…Hart and Risley (1968) suggested that materials are important in developing effective language programs for Downloaded by [The University of Manchester Library] at 03:11 01 December 2014 1 03 children. For example, toys and materials used in the studies include blocks (Rogers-Warren & Warren, 1980), tea sets (Angelo & Goldstein, 1990), and snack items (Gobbi, Cipani, Hudson, & Lapenta-Neudeck, 1986;Hart & Risley, 1968). For studies that investigated acquisition of specific object names (e.g., Losardo & Bricker, 1994), toy representations of target words (e.g., ewe, buck, and palm) and actual objects (e.g., kiwi, compact, and stencil) were also included in the materials.…”

Teaching Graphic Symbol Combinations to Children with Limited Speech During Shared Story Reading

“…We also used a least-to-most prompting hierarchy to elicit the production of symbol combinations from participants. The prompts were based on techniques used in naturalistic language teaching strategies and included expectant time delay (Halle, Baer, & Spradlin, 1981), questions, mands and models (Warren, McQuarter, & Rogers-Warren, 1984) as well as physical assistance to produce the symbol combinations (Angelo & Goldstein, 1990). …”