Penetrating the Classroom Social Network for Children With Language Impairment Via Peer Mediated Intervention

The PLS-5 is used to assess expressive language skills. Specific skills assessed include naming, expressing quantity, describing, using specific prepositions, grammatical markers, sentence structures, and emergent literacy skills. An assessor indicates whether a child passes (1) or does not pass (0) each item. Growth Scale Value: Range: Minimum = 100/Max = 900. Higher scores indicate better expressive language skills. Assessed at baseline, 3 months, and 9 months. Baseline reported.

A 26-item psychometrically sound checklist assessing children's pragmatic skills (e.g., conversational abilities, giving information), and DPP scores have strong classification accuracy in differentiating children with LI from non-affected classmates. This profile identifies non-verbal and verbal pragmatic deficits that may negatively influence social and academic communication in context. The questionnaire uses a 1 (never) to 4 (always) rating scale to assess the child's ability to appropriately communicate in social situations (i.e., "communicates [verbally and nonverbally] when playing with other children" or "introduces new conversation topics"). There is also a Not Appropriate option which indicates that the items is "Not appropriate for the child (culturally or other reason)." Raw Score Range: Minimum = 26/Max = 104. Higher scores on the DPP indicate greater language skills. Raw score is calculated by summing scores across the 26 items comprising the DPP.

The Teacher-Child Rating Scale is a 32-item teacher-report instrument that measures children's social competence. Teachers respond to statements on a 5-point scale (1 = strongly disagree, 5 = strongly agree). To calculate each subscale score, one must sum positive items; sum negative items; subtract the sum of negative times from the number 24; sum this value with the sum of the positive items.

Assertiveness Subscale: Range: (Min: 8/Max: 40 ) Behavior Control Subscale: (Min: 8/Max: 40) Peer Social Skills Subscale: (Min: 8/Max: 40) Talk Orientation Subscale: (Min: 8/Max: 40)

Higher scores indicate higher skills as measured by each subscale.

Researchers record the amount of incoming talk focal children experience using a hands-free voice-activated recorder worn by the child, with audio capture transcending the entire classroom day. Investigators process these recordings to capture incoming talk with proximate peers using the following process: (i) augment the voice-recorder ability/voice detection/processing algorithms from the Matlab Audio Systems Toolbox to determine if people are speaking; and (i) use 2D-proximity data from continuous location tracking to parse the audio into the cases where there is simultaneous peer proximity and recorded voice. Incoming peer talk will be used to calculated in-degree centrality for each child on each of 8 randomly selected recording days to examine change in in-degree centrality over the course of an academic year. Talk is operationalized as utterances per minute. An utterance is a continuous piece of speech by an individual before or after which there is silence.

Researchers record the amount of outgoing talk vocalized by focal children using a hands-free voice-activated recorder worn by the child, with audio capture transcending the entire classroom day. Investigators process these recordings to capture incoming talk with proximate peers using the following process: (i) augment the voice-recorder ability/voice detection/processing algorithms from the Matlab Audio Systems Toolbox to determine if people are speaking; and (i) use 2D-proximity data from continuous location tracking to parse the audio into the cases where there is simultaneous peer proximity and recorded voice. Incoming peer talk will be used to calculated out-degree centrality for each child on each of 8 randomly selected recording days to examine change in out-degree centrality over the course of an academic year. Talk is operationalized as utterances per minute. An utterance is a continuous piece of speech by an individual before or after which there is silence.

Peer interactions of focal children were observed 4 times over the academic year using Brock's established protocol. Researchers observe the focal child for 30 minutes during center time and apply a partial interval recording system involving 15 s of observation and 45 s of documentation. For peer interactions, each interval is coded for whether the target child is interacting with peers. These observation data will be used to calculate frequency of peer interactions experienced by target children during the 30-minute observation. Reliability will be assessed for 20% of observations via double-coding with observers blind to classroom and child condition.

Play interactions of focal children will be observed 4 times over the academic year using Brock's established protocol. Observers will observe the focal child for 30 minutes during center time and apply a partial interval recording system involving 15 s of observation and 45 s of documentation. For play interactions, each interval is coded for whether the target child is engaged in play with peers. These observation data will be used to calculate frequency of play interactions experienced by target children during the 30-minute observation. Reliability will be assessed for 20% of observations via double-coding with observers blind to classroom and child condition.