Evaluation of the listening to speech programme: Developing speech discrimination skills in young ch

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Evaluation of the listening to speech programme
Developing speech discrimination skills in young
children

• Maggie Vance
• Dept of Human Communication Science
• University College London

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Speech discrimination language

• Speech perception skills in infancy correlate
  with language development at 2yrs. (Tsao et el
  04)
• Auditory discrimination poorer in infants with FH
  of SLI, and predictive of language at 3yrs.
• (Benasich et al 02)

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Speech Discrimination difficulties

• Found in at least some children with
• Language Impairment Zeigler et al 2005
• Dyslexia Ramus et al 2003
• Significant History of Fluctuating Hearing Loss
  Petinou et al 2001
• Auditory Processing Deficit Chermak
  Musiek1997
• Speech Disorders Rvachew et al 2004

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Links with Literacy

• Foundation stage profile asks if child can hear
  initial and final sounds in words.
• Ability to discriminate phonemes a pre-cursor to
  phonological awareness.
• Difficulties not systematically addressed in
  school intervention or in SLT

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Listening to Speech Programme Aims

• Develop a school-based resource
• For ALL children with less well-developed skills
• Promote speech discrimination skills
• to facilitate the development of
• Phonological awareness skills
• Understanding of spoken language
• New vocabulary and other aspects of language

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Delivery

• Children in Reception Classes
• Small Groups
• 30 minute sessions
• 3 x a week
• 6 weeks

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Minimal Pair Picture Tasks

• Range of activities
• Hierarchy of difficulty of contrasts
• sheep / ship
• school / stool
• Some practice against background noise
• Some practice with multiple speakers

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Example

• Fridge magnets
• Put picture in back of lorry
• Picture lotto
• Draw round the picture

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Participants

• 10 primary schools in SE England
• 308 children in Reception classes assessed
• Speech Input Processing in Children
• (Vance, Rosen, Coleman)
• Linguistic Concepts sub-test CELF-P
• 56 selected for intervention
• The 4 or 8 children in each school with weakest
  profiles on assessment

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Speech Input Processing in Children (SIPc)
XAB task
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Whole Group Findings

• Children aged 4-5 years
• SIPc
• Linguistic concepts on CELF-P
• RAPT
• Significant correlations between speech
  discrimination, and verbal comprehension
  expression

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Intervention Group Characteristics
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DesignCluster randomisation of schools Blind
reassessment at T2 and T3 (mostly)
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Intervention Groups Matched
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(No Transcript)
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Outcomes

• MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES
• Speech Discrimination SIPc
• Receptive language CELF-P
• SECONDARY OUTCOME MEASURES
• Expressive language - RAPT
• Teacher Questionnaire - attentive listening
• Digit span WMTB-C
• Rhyme awareness PIPA
• POSSIBLE PREDICTIVE VARIABLES
• Non-Verbal abilities - Ravens Matrices
• Hearing History Questionnaire
• Hyperactivity Conduct ratings SDQ
• Speech output EAT

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• Intervention vs No Intervention
• No significant difference between intervention
  groups on any outcome measure - both improved
  equally

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• Intervention vs No Intervention
• No significant difference between intervention
  groups on any outcome measure - both improved
  equally

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Age and Experience

• Are improvements in speech discrimination at T2
• to do with age?
• Probably not (no sig correlation with age)
• to do with school experience?
• Dont know?
• to do with test experience?
• Probably!

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At T1 Group 1 11/28 not able to do SIPc
Group 2 7/28 not able to do SIPc
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Rhyme Awareness (PIPA)
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Group 2 comparing T1-T2, T2-T3
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Predictors and base-line scores

• Baseline scores in receptive language (CELF-P)
  significantly predicted by
• Baseline teacher questionnaire
• Baseline scores in speech discrimination (SIPc)
  significantly predicted by
• Hearing History questionnaire
• Conduct rating
• BUT not with
• non-verbal skills speech production
  hyperactivity rating.

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Predictive Variables

• Increases in receptive language (CELF-P) (T1-T2)
  significantly predicted by
• Hearing History Questionnaire
• Increases in speech discrimination (SIPc)
  significantly predicted by
• Hearing History Questionnaire
• Baseline teacher questionnaire

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Predictive Variables

• Final Score in receptive language (CELF-P)
  significantly predicted by
• Hyperactivity rating
• Final Score in speech discrimination (SIPc)
  significantly predicted by
• Baseline teacher questionnaire
• Non-verbal skills

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Pitfalls

• Group
• Heterogeneous group
• selection criteria too broad
• Subtle differences between Intervention Groups
• Measurement
• Outcome measurement
• Not sufficiently robust (SIPc) (Noise not done at
  T2)
• Not sufficiently sensitive (CELF-P)
• Practice effects on baseline / outcome assessments

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• Programme
• Lack of developmental profile of discrimination
  of contrasts for planning programme
• Generic programme not tailored to individual
  childrens profiles

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Thanks to

• The Health Foundation
• Stuart Rosen and Mike Coleman
• DHCS students