Abstract

Previous studies have examined how the language skills of children with adolescent mothers differs from children of older mothers. However, there is limited information on what specific strategies adolescent mothers utilize to increase early language and emergent literacy skills in their children. The aim of the present study is to examine adolescent mothers’ use of strategies to increase the early language and emergent literacy skills of their young children. A sample of 14 adolescent mothers enrolled in a teen parenting program were surveyed on their use of common strategies that are shown to facilitate early development of language and literacy skills in young children, and they provided a self-report of their child’s language development using a norm-referenced tool. A researcher developed questionnaire was used to determine the frequency of strategies used by the adolescent mothers. The MacArthur Bates Communicative Development Inventories were used to gather child language development data to compare with the frequency of strategy usage. The measures were analyzed with ANOVAs, Pearson Correlations and Spearman’s rank-order correlations to determine the significance and relationship between variables. Adolescent mothers were found to generally score low on the Self-Assessment of Language and Literacy Implementation (SALLI), with deficits specifically in the areas of Directiveness and Home Environment. The CDIs showed that the children were reported to have below average language development, and their scores were significantly related to aspects of the adolescent mother’s reported implementation.

Thesis Completion

2016

Semester

Fall

Thesis Chair/Advisor

Towson, Jacqueline

Degree

Bachelor of Science (B.S.)

College

College of Health and Public Affairs

Department

Communication Sciences and Disorders

Location

Orlando (Main) Campus

Language

English

Access Status

Open Access

Release Date

6-1-2017

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