Multicultural Education Research Presentation

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Tanuel Ford Jackson Department of Education, Tennessee State University EDAD 6300: Multicultural Education Dr. Monica Neshyba 11/20/24

Vocabulary Knowledge Gaps Predispose Low Income Children for Academic Failure

Learning Path

References

Conclusion/Implications

Results/Findings

Community Member Interview

Literature Review

Background

Introduction

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introduction

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• Marginalized children perform poorly on most indicators of academic success
• Discrepant performance between advantaged mainstream white students and less advantaged peers is evident upon kindergarten entry
• Gaps in performance are believed to stem from vocabulary knowledge gaps
• These gaps impact language processing, vocabulary, and consequently measures of intelligence (Golinkoff et al., 2019)

Achievement Gaps suggest Lack of ability

Significance

It is imperative to call out factors that influence performance to inform instructional practices and ensure non-biased assessment.

Language = Currency of Education

Speech-Language Pathologist

Language/Literacy Connections

Background

Literature Review

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Taylor Massey PK Teacher Early Learning Center *Psychology background

Community member interview

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Research Question 1: What can early learning programs do to address knowledge gaps before children enter kindergarten? Research Question 2: How can elementary school curriculum and instructional pedagogy level the playing field for students who have varying language profiles?

results/findings

implications

conclusion

• Early childhood and school age programs can use evidence-based strategies to expand language (and consequently overall academic performance)
• Lack of vocabulary and language do not equal lack of learning ability
• Print/visually rich environments support language development
• Assessments may measure exposure and experiences instead of skills

• A knowledge gap exists between affluent children and disadvantaged peers
• Discrepancies between vocabulary skills manifest in achievement gaps evidenced across all academic measures
• Macro and micro factors influence language input and thus language development
• Rich language experiences mediate language development across SES levels

references

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Speech and Language Development

Language skills are foundational to literacy and academic success.

Language Underpinnings of Literacy

Every academic subject relies on language to convey concepts.

30 Million Word Gap

• Describes significant discrepancy in words heard by affluent children and disadvantaged peers (Hirsh-Pasek et al., 2015)
• Children living in poverty hear less words (Hirsh-Pasek et al., 2015) and less complex utterances (Romeo et al., 2018)
• Caregiver interaction sparks vocabulary development (Golinkoff et al., 2019)
• Vocabulary development is critical to academic success across academic areas (Logan et al., 2019)

Denying the 30 Million Word Gap

• The original study did not consider overheard language
• Studies found directed language is of greater benefit to language development due to value of joint attention, shared context, and prosodic language feature (Golinkoff et al., 2019)
• Richness of home environment was noted to mediate language development, not income (Golinkoff et al., 2019)

Parent-Child Interaction

• Direct and reciprocal language stimulation supports language development across all domains and consequently primes children for reading and listening comprehension (Golinkoff et al., 2019)
• Children who engage in language turn taking with an adult show increased activation in Broca's area of the brain (Romeo et al., 2018)
• Parent interactions are boosted by book reading which provides exposure to increased lexical and syntactic complexity (Logan et al., 2019)

30 Million Word Gap

• Priviledged children have richer lexical output (Vanormelingen et al., 2020) and receive higher quality input (Hussain et al., 2023)
• Children from high SES outperform disadvantaged peers by 60% and gaps persist through high school (Hussain et al., 2023)
• Differences in language input are noted to explain language and vocabulary gaps (Logan et al., 2019)

Macro Effects on Vocabulary Development

On the macro level, poverty is associated with:

• lower maternal education and meaningful parent-child interactions (Rowe & Weisleder, 2020)
• higher maternal stress levels (cortisol levels) which are related to child development
• decreased gestation periods, premature birth, decreased brain gray matter (Der Nederlanden et al., 2023)

Micro Effects on Vocabulary Development

On the micro level, poverty is associated with:

• less engagement in language stimulation activities (Rowe & Weisleder, 2020) and less language directed towards children (Der Nederlanden et al., 2023)
• less socially mediated language (Rowe & Weisleder, 2020)

Early Childhood and Language Development

• Parents spend the most time with infants during periods of prelexical development (Rowe & Weisleder, 2020)
• Before speaking eye tracking, gestures, pointing, vocalizing, and babbling emerge (Hirsch-Pasek et al., 2015; Hussain et al., 2023)
• Children from lower SES reach babbling onset later (Vanormelingen et al., 2020) and use fewer gestures (Hussain et al., 2023)
• By 18 months, children from higher SES have more words and by 2 years old, they have twice as many words (Hussain et al., 2023)

INTERVIEW TRIANGULATION

• Students from similar SES enter PK with varying language skills
• Students whose parents are actively involved have better language (vocabulary and sentence length)
• Less involved parents do not have as much "quality time" with students due to work
• PK classrooms are language (print/visuals) rich and support language development
• Creative Curriculum is intentioned for expanding vocabulary through thematic study

Research Question 1 (Early Childhood Programs)

Shared book reading tasks (Logan et al., 2019)

• Joint attention helps children acquire words

Adult-child conversation centered around child's interest (Golinkoff et al., 2019)

• Increases language input connected to a context
• Provides opportunities for adults to model, recast, and expand language
• Dialogic experiences activate Broca's area and establish neural pathways associated with language development

Research Question 2 (Elementary Curriculum)

• "Languagize" Classrooms (Golinkoff et al., 2019)
• Book Reading (Wasik et al., 2016)
• Multiple reads, explicit vocabulary definition, encourage dialogue around key terms, opportunities for retelling
• Following book reading with extension tasks
• Opportunities for conversational turn taking which invites feedback and develops neural circuitry (Romeo et al., 2018)