Improving Language Comprehension in Preschool Children with Language Difficulties: A Cluster Randomized Trial

The purpose of the study is to assess the effects of an intervention targeted at language comprehension for children with language difficulties. The study examined the extent to which the intervention improved the participating children's language comprehension, and whether the effects found were lasting.

The results show that, immediately after the intervention, there were moderately positive effects on near, intermediate and distal measures of language comprehension. At the follow-up tests seven months after the intervention, effects on near and intermediate measures had weakened, whereas the effects on the distal measure had remained stable. According to the authors, the study suggests that it is possible to improve language comprehension in children with language difficulties in classroom settings.

The authors conducted a randomised trial in 148 preschool classrooms in two municipalities. Out of 860 children whose language skills were assessed, the authors selected the 35% with the lowest scores for further participation (a total of 301 children). These children were randomly divided into an intervention group (157 children) or a control group (144 children). The average age of the children was 57.84 months at the beginning of the study.

The intervention targeted language comprehension and aimed at improving children's vocabulary, narrative skills and their ability to listen actively. The intervention lasted 13 months, with five 6-week training blocks (a total of 30 weeks). The training weeks comprised two 30-minute group sessions and one 15-minute individual session. The intervention was carried out by preschool teachers who received training before the intervention and halfway through the intervention. The control group followed the usual preschool programme that involved reading and language activities, but in a far less structured format.

The effects of the intervention were measured using language performance instruments that were 1) relatively near the intervention's content (words used in the intervention), 2) intermediate from the intervention, and 3) distal from the intervention, for example generalised standard measures. The children were tested individually with the different measurement instruments before the intervention, immediately after the intervention, at the end of their last year of preschool and at follow-up measurements seven months after the intervention.

B Hagen, Å. M., Melby-Lervåg, M., & Lervåg, A. (2017). Improving Language Comprehension in Preschool Children with Language Difficulties: A Cluster Randomized Trial. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 58(10), 1132-1140.