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10/10/2015  |   9:45 AM - 11:00 AM   |  Andrew Foster Auditorium

Understanding Variability in Literacy Growth for Deaf Children with Different Characteristics and Different Language Experiences

Using data from a three-year longitudinal study of deaf children who were ages 3-5 in the first wave of data collection, and who were assessed for language, cognitive, and literacy skills in each of three successive years, this talk will present an analysis of factors that contribute both to the level of literacy (using a letter-word identification test) and the rate of achievement gain over the three year period. Data come from the Early Education Longitudinal Study conducted by the NSF Science of Learning Center on Visual Language and Visual Learning (VL2) at Gallaudet University. Results evaluate variability of indicators for subgroups of children with specific characteristics, such as children with and without cochlear implants and children with and without deaf parents. Findings reveal that being in a participant subgroup does little to change performance or reduce variability. However, the early acquisition of language skills (signed or spoken and independent of subgroup), strongly predicts the rate of reading growth over a three-year period. The results emphasize the importance of early language exposure and development, independent of modality. The presentation will include a discussion of home and individual characteristics that contribute to effective early language development.

• Attendees will understand that within any subgroup of the deaf/HH pre-school aged population, there will be considerable variability in the rate of literacy learning.
• Attendees will understand the huge impact of early language experience from birth on literacy acquisition in early elementary grades in school.

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Thomas Allen (POC,Primary Presenter,Author), Gallaudet University, thomas.allen@gallaudet.edu;
Thomas E. Allen, Ph.D. has a long career in the field of deaf education research spanning 30 years. It includes many years of conducting and directing national demographics and assessment projects with large national samples of deaf children, holding the position of Dean of the Graduate School and Research during a period of expansion of Gallaudet’s Ph.D. programs, and being the Founding Director of the NSF-funded Science of Learning Center for Visual Language and Visual Learning. For over ten years he directed the Annual Survey of Deaf and Hard of Hearing Children and Youth and has published many articles examining the characteristics of deaf children in school. He possesses strong abilities in the areas of complex project management, survey design and psychometrics, statistical modeling, and directing collaborative teams of researchers from different disciplines. He led the design and execution of the Early Education Longitudinal Study from within the Gallaudet Early Education and Literacy Lab, which he directs, and is currently the Program Director of the newly established interdisciplinary Ph.D. Program in Educational Neuroscience. He led in the development of an online portal for ASL Assessment, an online strategy for soliciting research participants providing a means for investigators access to samples, and an online Data Sharing Portal for archiving and sharing federally-funded datasets.