| Description |
Not all children begin primary school equally prepared to learn to read. Compared to children from higher-income homes, children from lower-income homes often display fewer emergent literacy skills. Children with disabilities also face substantial challenges in developing emergent literacy skills and learning to read. The evidence-based practice of Dialogic Reading (DR) is one example of a shared reading intervention which has shown significant results on children's oral language skills and knowledge of print. Although DR has been replicated with a variety of populations and implementers, the potential effects of DR when implemented by parents of children with a developmental delay or disability from lower-income homes had yet to be identified. Using a multiple probe design across participants, this study examined the effects of the Modified Dialogic Reading (MDR) intervention package when implemented by parents with a lower socioeconomic status (SES) with their young child with a developmental delay or disability. Preliminary results suggest that when implemented with fidelity, the MDR intervention has the potential to increase the oral language skills of young children who are at higher risk for difficulty in reading and later academic achievement. This study makes a unique contribution to the field of early childhood special education and the existing literature on DR, parent-implemented interventions, and coaching models by modifying a research-based intervention to facilitate its use by parents with a lower SES who want to help their children succeed by engaging them in shared reading. |
