Narrative Assessment of Deaf and Hard-of-Hearing Preschoolers

• In Event: Language and Literacy Learning of Deaf and Hard-of-Hearing Children

Abstract

Objectives
This study describes features of deaf and hard-of-hearing (DHH) preschoolers’ narratives and considers the validity of two narrative assessment tasks.
Theoretical Perspective
Young hearing children’s oral narratives, or retellings of familiar, sequential events, are strongly predictive of later literacy skills (e.g., Griffin, Hemphill, Camp, & Wolf, 2004), and this may be particularly true for children at risk for language problems (Paul & Smith, 1993). While it is known that school-age children who are DHH often struggle to utilize decontextualized language and produce appropriately coherent and complex narratives (Crosson & Geers, 2001; Paul, 1998), less is known about young DHH children’s narrative skills. Furthermore, little is known about how to reliably assess narrative skills in this population of learners.
Oral retellings of wordless picture books, such as Frog Where Are You? (Mayer, 1969), are commonly used to assess narrative skills in children, including older DHH students (e.g., Rathmann, Mann, & Morgan, 2007) and hearing preschoolers (e.g., Curenton & Justice). The validity of this assessment for DHH preschoolers has not been established. Furthermore, it has proven difficult to adapt rubrics designed for use with hearing preschoolers’ oral retellings of Frog Where Are You?, such as the Narrative Assessment Protocol (NAP; Pence, Justice, & Gosse, 2007), to this population. The present study seeks to describe DHH children’s narrative performance on two retell tasks, Frog Where Are You? and a shorter, researcher-developed story, addressing whether these assessments are valid measures of syntax, lexical diversity, and narrative understanding in DHH preschoolers.
Method
Trained examiners elicited oral retellings of Frog, Where are You? and the researcher-developed story (in which a young girl falls off her bike) from 21 DHH preschoolers who use spoken language at the beginning and end of an academic school year. Examiners also asked a series of comprehension questions following each retelling. Children’s narratives were recorded, transcribed, and analyzed using the Systematic Analysis of Language Transcripts (SALT; Miller & Chapman, 2004). Researchers examined correlations between assessments, across time points, and to performance on a standardized measure of expressive vocabulary (EOWPVT; Brownell, 2000).
Results
Descriptive statistics are displayed in Table 1. Syntax (MLU) was stable over time for both assessments, and lexical diversity (total number of different words) was stable over time only for Frog Where Are You? (see Table 2). Performance on both assessments was stable over time for narrative understanding (as measured by comprehension questions) (see Table 3). Furthermore, performance on the two assessments was significantly correlated for all variables at pretest and for all but one (lexical diversity) at posttest, and all narrative variables were significantly correlated to performance on the EOWPVT, with the exception of posttest syntax and lexical diversity on the researcher-developed assessment.
Significance
The strong relation between the assessments and to a standardized measure of expressive language, along with their apparent stability over time, suggest that both Frog Where Are You? and the shorter, researcher-developed story are valid assessments of DHH preschoolers’ narrative skills. These therefore hold promise for future research on DHH children’s meaning-based literacy skills.

Authors

• Hannah Goldberg, Georgia State University

• Amy R. Lederberg, Georgia State University

• Susan Easterbrooks, Georgia State University