Language Culture and Curriculum
Editor and Book Reviews Editor: Eoghan Mac Aogain (St Patrick's College)
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Volume: 16 Number: 1 Page: 48–59
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Using Narrative Language Intervention as a Tool to Increase Communicative Competence in Spanish-Speaking Children
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Lisa Schoenbrodt, Marie Kerins and Jacqueline Gesell
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Twelve Spanish-speaking school-aged children participated in an 8-week pre-test/post-test design investigation targeting improvement of their communicative competence through a narrative intervention programme.
The investigation also examined the efficacy of providing an intervention in the children's native language. The control group received the intervention in English, while the experimental group received
the intervention in Spanish. Narrative samples obtained from the pre/post testing examined communication unit (CU) clauses, number of words, story grammar and narrative style. The findings from the study
revealed that the use of a narrative intervention increased communicative competence in both groups. In addition, the experimental group showed a significant difference in performance indicating that intervention
in the native language yields greater success compared with intervention presented in English.
© Multilingual Matters 2003
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