The Effects of Fast ForWord Language on the Phonemic Awareness and Reading Skills of School-Age Children With Language Impairments and Poor Reading Skills

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Issue Date
2009-11Author
Loeb, Diane Frome
Gillam, Ronald B.
Hoffman, LaVae
Brandel, Jayne Michelle
Marquis, Janet
Publisher
American Speech-Language-Hearing Association
Type
Article
Article Version
Scholarly/refereed, author accepted manuscript
Rights
© American Speech-Language-Hearing Association
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Show full item recordAbstract
Purpose—To examine the efficacy of Fast For-Word Language (FFW-L) and 2 other interventions for improving the phonemic awareness and reading skills of children with specific language impairment with concurrent poor reading skills. Method—A total of 103 children (age 6;0 to 8;11 [years;months]) with language impairment and poor reading skills participated. The children received either FFW-L computerized intervention, a computer-assisted language intervention (CALI), an individualized language intervention (ILI), or an attention control (AC) computer program. Results—The children in the FFW-L, CALI, and ILI conditions made significantly greater gains in blending sounds in words compared with the AC group at immediate posttest. Long-term gains 6 months after treatment were not significant but yielded a medium effect size for blending sounds in words. None of the interventions led to significant changes in reading skills. Conclusion—The improvement in phonemic awareness, but not reading, in the FFW-L, CALI, and ILI interventions limits their use with children who have language impairment and poor reading skills. Similar results across treatment conditions suggest that acoustically modified speech was not a necessary component for improving phonemic awareness.
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Citation
Loeb, D. F., Gillam, R. B., Hoffman, L., Brandel, J., & Marquis, J. (2009). The Effects of Fast ForWord Language on the Phonemic Awareness and Reading Skills of School-Age Children With Language Impairments and Poor Reading Skills. American Journal of Speech-Language Pathology / American Speech-Language-Hearing Association, 18(4), 376–387. http://doi.org/10.1044/1058-0360(2009/08-0067)
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