Dr. Ronald Jones,
CCC-A

Coordinator
Communication Sciences and Disorders Program
Norfolk State University


back to LASER Programs

Establishing a Test Protocol for Speech-Language Pathologists and Audiologists to Assess the Prerequisite Literacy Acquisition Skills of African-American Children from Low SES Backgrounds

Recent (2001) sanctions from the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (Rockville, MD) have authorized speech-language pathologists and audiologists to provide literacy performance testing and literacy remediation therapy to communicatively impaired children and adults. A preponderance of research that shows a strong correlation between early childhood language disturbances, namely, poor phonological awareness (assessed by speech-language pathologists) and central auditory processing problems (assessed by audiologists), and literacy acquisition problems. Research shows an even stronger correlation when adverse factors associated with racial/ethnic background and poverty are considered. The tests speech-language pathologists and audiologists routinely use to identify speech, language and hearing disorders among children must now be adapted or expanded for use in assessing prerequisite literacy skills in children. These adaptations must be tested to determine their efficacy, particularly, with children who are at greater risk for literacy acquisition problems because of disparate racial, ethnic, and/or socio-economic backgrounds.

This project will attempt to: 1) replicate the findings of other researchers who have identified strong correlations between phonological awareness deficiencies, central auditory processing disturbances and reading acquisition problems in children, particularly, with children from low socio-economic status (SES) backgrounds; and 2) test the efficacy of using an adapted and expanded test battery that will include test of: language performance, articulation, phonological awareness, vocabulary, hearing, central auditory processing, reading readiness, and reading rate/comprehension. This test battery will be administered to a representative sample of kindergarten, 1st, 2nd, and 3rd grade African-American children with varied socio-economic backgrounds. Their performances will be compared to that of a cohort of non-minority children matched for age, gender, grade level, and socio-economic back-ground. It is the goal of this project to "norm" the tests (battery) used with these populations, and to develop a series of culturally sensitive, language/literacy acquisition treatment procedures. The results of this investigation should: 1) help speech-language pathologists and audiologists in their diagnosis and remediation of the language/literacy deficiencies, particularly those seen in racially or ethnically diverse, and economically disadvantaged minority children who are at risk for literacy learning problems; and 2) promote the development of prerequisite language activities that correlate with emerging literacy skills.