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Opportunities for communication in classrooms serving children with developmental disabilities
J Sigafoos1, D Roberts, M Kerr
1Fred and Eleanor Schonell Special Education Research Centre, University of Queensland, Australia.
Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders
|June 1, 1994
Summary
Teachers in special education and daycare settings provided limited communication opportunities for young children. More opportunities were correlated with better child communication skills, suggesting teachers did integrate them into activities.
Area of Science:
- Developmental Psychology
- Special Education
- Early Childhood Education
Background:
- Effective communication is crucial for early childhood development.
- Understanding teacher-provided communication opportunities informs pedagogical strategies.
- Previous research has not extensively quantified these opportunities in diverse preschool settings.
Purpose of the Study:
- To document the frequency and types of communication opportunities teachers provide to children.
- To compare communication opportunities in special education classrooms versus typical daycare settings.
- To investigate the relationship between child communication skills and teacher-provided opportunities.
Main Methods:
- Observational study across seven special education classrooms and one daycare center.
- Systematic recording of communication opportunities during over 6,000 observation intervals.
- Analysis of the types of communication opportunities (e.g., naming, requesting, answering, imitating).
Main Results:
- Less than 14% of observation intervals in special education settings included communication opportunities.
- The most frequent opportunities involved naming objects/events, followed by requesting, answering, and imitating.
- Similar low frequencies of communication opportunities were observed in the daycare center.
- A significant positive correlation was found between children's existing communication abilities and the number of opportunities they received in special education classrooms.
Conclusions:
- Teachers in both special education and typical daycare settings provided a limited number of communication opportunities.
- The type of communication opportunity provided was predominantly receptive (naming), with fewer expressive opportunities.
- Teachers appear to integrate communication opportunities into classroom activities, but the overall frequency is low.
- Interventions aimed at increasing expressive communication opportunities may benefit children with developmental disabilities.