Educational effects of a vocabulary intervention on preschoolers’ word knowledge and conceptual development: A cluster-randomized trial

Neuman, Susan B., Newman, Ellen H., & Dwyer, Julie. (2011). Educational effects of a vocabulary intervention on preschoolers’ word knowledge and conceptual development: A cluster-randomized trial. Reading Research Quarterly, 46(3), 249-271.

A vocabulary intervention for preschoolers that featured explicit teaching about words, and about the categories those words belong to, was rigorously tested in this study. The evidence here indicated that the intervention was more effective at building young children’s vocabulary and conceptual development, at least when measured by a number of researcher-designed instruments, than a control treatment that seemed like typical “business as usual” preschool instruction (though the standardized assessments used showed no differences between groups). In addition, there was also evidence that the advantages for the children who experienced the intervention carried over at least six months in the future (though that evidence is not so strong due to natural attrition in the participant group when many of the children left Head Start). Although there was random assignment to the treatment and control groups, and meticulous care was taken to keep the treatment and control groups as similar as possible (and to account for any differences), this was a “cluster-randomized trial”, with intact classes being randomly assigned rather than individuals, so it was not an experiment in the strictest sense, though the methodology here probably is rigorous enough to enable some causal inferences. The children in the classes being studied were all in Head Start settings, so that context delineates the socioeconomic group being studied. The authors are concerned about vocabulary development for low-income children, citing studies that indicate that such children’s vocabulary development lags behind that of their middle-class counterparts, so the choice of study participants made sense. If an intervention works well for Head Start children, it likely will work well for other low-income preschool children.

The intervention, called WOW (for World of Words—yet another educational acronym), is clearly described in detail. The intervention has eight components: 1) phonological awareness, 2) content video, 3) book reading, 4) in-category picture cards, 5) out-of-category picture cards, 6) challenge words, 7) journal writing activity, and 8) review. I would like to have seen some scripts of teacher and student talk for each element, but perhaps that will be found in later publications.

I must say I am ambivalent about WOW, although learning more about it may assist me in resolving that. What I like here is the emphasis on higher order skills like categorizing and making connections across words. Young children ARE capable of this kind of thinking, and it is a rigorous, interesting, and meaningful way to learn new vocabulary. The evidence here suggests that this sort of instruction builds skills that have potential to transfer to strategies for unlocking novel vocabulary, and that seems much more useful than the instruction involving lists and definitions that I still see all too often. I also like the multimodal approach, with a variety of different kinds of input and output. What worries me is that I can see something like this quickly turning into scripted, published, commercially marketed programs, and I can see such programs as something administrators might want to mandate, especially for low-income populations. That wouldn’t necessarily be a bad thing, if such programs were chosen with teacher input, and if teachers could choose to implement them flexibly. I understand the need to insure implementation “fidelity” in an experiment, but for classroom use, I don’t want the teacher’s decision-making power to be removed. I know that in early childhood settings, teachers do not always possess the same educational background as they do in elementary schools, but these teachers still know their students and their needs better than anyone else does. A script for teaching vocabulary could be helpful, especially in cases where teachers do not have extensive professional coursework. I do see a danger, though, even when an intervention is as carefully planned as this one was. Results like this study’s can be influential and far-reaching, and as always, it will be important to use such results in wise ways that acknowledge the complexities of instruction, allow for differences, and recognize that while there may be some good solutions, there are no panaceas.