Research Projects
Current Projects
EMBRACE Project
The Enhanced Moved by Reading to Accelerate Comprehension in English (EMBRACE), is a bilingual, technology-based intervention designed to support children’s language and reading comprehension during parent–child shared reading. The program combines interactive digital storybooks with an intelligent tutoring system that guides families through questions and activities that encourage children to connect story events, actions, and ideas. The project focuses particularly on language development in Latino bilingual children.
Spanish Screener for Language Impairment in Children (SSLIC)
The Spanish Screener for Language Impairment in Children (SSLIC), is a brief screener designed to help identify Spanish–English bilingual children who may be at risk for developmental language disorder. The screener is currently being validated to determine how accurately and reliably it distinguishes children with typical language development from children with Developmental Language Disorder (DLD). The study aims to support earlier and more culturally and linguistically appropriate identification of bilingual children who may benefit from further evaluation or intervention. Access our flyer or contact us!
Language Dyslexia Screening Questionnaire (LDysQ) Project
The Language and Dyslexia Screening Questionnaire (LDYSQ) project is developing and validating a brief parent-completed questionnaire to identify risk for dyslexia and developmental language disorder in six-year-old children who speak English or Spanish. The project brings together families, schools, and healthcare providers to support earlier identification and referrals for further evaluation. Its long-term goal is to make language and reading-risk screening part of routine pediatric care.
BSF Project
For this project, we are working in coordination with the US Israel Binational Science Foundation to investigate models of bilingual teaching for preschool aged children. We are examining language transfer depending on which language is introduced first in a narrative language intervention. We are currently conducting transcription and analyses for this project, and not recruiting. Please feel free to reach out for more information about this project. For more information about this project, check the BSF website.
Reading Comprehension in Monolingual and Bilingual Children (MBRC) Project
The purpose of this project is to bring together multidisciplinary researchers to
address poor reading comprehension. In collaboration with Arizona State University,
preschool and kindergarten predictors of poor reading comprehension were identified
in 6th graders to enable identification of the most at risk children even before they
learn to read. This study analyzes early predictors of reading comprehension after
students have learned to read fluently. It also tests the controversial proposal that
some children are late-emerging
‘poor comprehenders’ with reading comprehension deficits appearing in 6th grade despite
no prior evidence of problems. We also hope to determine whether results of these
studies differ for children who entered preschool speaking English or speaking primarily
Spanish.
EYEPlay
What began with a simple idea has become over a decade-long exploration of what it means to teach drama for preschoolers: What is the clearest way to transfer drama facilitation skills to teachers? How can drama support language learning? How can drama support emergent bilingualism? How do you measure effective drama facilitation? How do you measure children’s learning and social/emotional development when they participate in drama-based lessons? These questions have fueled this projects growth and expansion across the country in the last decade.
The program design today is a direct result of the active participation of hundreds of classroom teachers, teaching artists, researchers and, of course, children. To date, it has been implemented in 122 classrooms, including 24 bilingual/dual language classrooms in Arizona and Florida.