Walkie Talkies

Kate and Hannah with their pedometres

The job of a researcher requires vast amounts of sitting, thinking, reading, and typing.
As a result, my students and I have decided to conduct a 10 week challenge to walk at least 10,000 steps per day. We live in different cities from one another, so if we find ourselves in the same place, we try to walk (and talk) together. Consequently we have called ourselves the Walkie Talkies and are plotting our steps using Excel spreadsheets.
There are prizes not only for the most steps walked, but also for the largest standard deviation, and the most improved since baseline. We may even use more of the statistical capabilities to explore our results as an exercise in quantitative stats! I will keep you posted on how we are doing.

March-May 2012 summary

AUSTRALIAN RESEARCH COUNCIL FUTURE FELLOWSHIP UPDATE
‘Speaking my language: International speech acquisition in Australia’
Written by Kim Woodland, Research Institute for Professional Practice, Learning and Education for the May 2012 RIPPLE Update

Sharynne and Dr Yvonne Wren in Bathurst

Sharynne began March by speaking to over 400 parents and teachers from 30 rural and remote schools throughout New South Wales. Her presentation—Supporting children’s speech and language development—was part of RDE RELATE, a community education initiative from the Department of Education and Communities’ Country Areas Program which aims to support rural and remote communities by using videoconferencing to broadcast important speakers and issues. Work has also continued on the Early Years Education Collaborative Research Network (EYE CRN), including a two-day meeting in Albury where Sharynne worked with colleagues from three universities to analyse data from the Longitudinal Study of Australian Children (LSAC). She used the wealth of information from her Fellowship experience to focus on children speaking languages other than English. Dr Yvonne Wren from The University of the West of England visited in April, and they worked on a journal article, conference presentation and a grant submission. An international speech assessment project Sharynne has been supervising with Dr Martin Barrett, which involved Masters’ students from East Tennessee State University creating a prototype computer program for the International Speech Assessment, was wrapped up in early May with a final presentation. Sharynne has also continued publishing, with three co-authored journal articles on children's speech and language recently being released.

The RIPPLE Effect is published here: http://www.csu.edu.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0004/255163/The-RIPPLE-Effect-Issue-1-2012.pdf

Systematic review of speech assessments

Sarah Verdon and I have been spending each Friday undertaking a systematic review of speech (articulation and phonology) assessments for speakers of languages other than English. The review encompasses the conceptual and operational aspects of the assessments. We have had a lot of fun working out what the manuals are saying by using Google Translate, then asking our colleagues from around the world who speak the languages (and we also try to ask the people who have written the test). There are some very impressive assessments that are available, and I can't wait until it is completed and we are ready to tell the English-speaking world about them.

Sarah with German, Spanish, Turkish, Greek, Cantonese and Norwegian tests

Analysing Vietnamese children's speech with students in Ho Chi Minh City

This afternoon I spent an hour discussing speech analysis with two groups of students from Ho Chi Minh City (via Skype) facilitated by Janella Christie and a Vietnamese interpreter. It is exciting to see how they have been applying my lectures from May 2011 to real children in Vietnam. They have been developing assessments and analyses that are relevant to the different pronunciations from different parts of Vietnam. They have also been finding phonological patterns that are typical for English-speaking children, and not listed in Tang and Barlow (2006). It is a privilege to be a part of developing the profession of speech pathology in VietNam.

Help! My computer is full

We often take our computers for granted.
This week I was copying data (video and audio files as well as images from the children's drawings) from our Talking about Talking research onto my computer -- and received the message that my computer was full! Researching about children's speech does take a lot of computer storage, and is another factor and cost in undertaking research in this field.

International Speech Assessment: Finalization of the ETSU capstone project

Today was the final presentation of the capstone project undertaken by the masters' students from East Tennessee State University. Over the past 18 months they have been working with Dr. Martin Barrett and myself to create a prototype for the International Speech Assessment. During their presentation, the students said that they had completed 2897.5 hours of work on the project! It has been a very an interesting process to learn what is important for creating a working computer program.
An earlier blog posting about the project (May 2011) is here

ISA Capstone Team: L-R Howard Morris, Jim Johnson, Dr. Martin Barrett, Nathanial McConnell, Heather Haley, Chandan Biswas, Eric Barclay, Kris Cunigan, Aaron Stokes

Speech-language pathologists at war?

Two journal articles have been published recently that talk about battles:

1. McCormack, J., McAllister, L. McLeod, S. & Harrison, L. J., (2012). Knowing, having, doing: The battles of childhood speech impairment. Child Language Teaching and Therapy, 28, 141-157.
2. Kenny, B. & Lincoln, M. (2012). Sport, scales or war?Metaphors speech-language pathologists use to describe caseload management. International Journal of Speech-Language Pathology, 14(3), 247-259.   

 When we enter the speech-language pathology profession we don't realize we will be engaged in battles (e.g.,  having to fight for our clients, fight for rights within our workplaces, etc); nor do we think about the battles our clients and their families experience (e.g., in order to access services).

Student graduation

Rebekah Lockart graduated on 20th April with a Master of Speech and Language Pathology from the Faculty of Human Sciences, Department of Linguistics, Macquarie University in Sydney. Congratulations Rebekah! Her thesis was titled: “Factors that enhance Australian speech-language pathologists’ assessment of the speech of Cantonese-speaking children” and it was a privilege to supervise her work (we had an official arrangement between the two universities). 

During June Rebekah will be presenting aspects of her thesis at the Speech Pathology Australia National Conference in Hobart, Australia and I will be presenting a different paper based on this work at the International Clinical Phonetics and Linguistics Conference in Cork, Ireland. We have also just received positive reviews from an international journal about a paper based on her thesis – so soon the world will also know about the important work that Rebekah has undertaken.

Rebekah and David Lockart

 

Supervision of distance and part-time higher degree research students

Today I coordinated a supervisory workshop for the CSU Research Office titled "Supervision of distance, remote and part-time higher degree research students" The workshop was attended by academics from four universities (Australian National University, University of Canberra, Charles Sturt University, and University of New South Wales).
The other presenters were
Rob Doubleday, Manager, Research Policy and Coordinator | CSU Research Office

Dr Rod Pope, Head, Research Professional Development Programs | CSU Research Office

Kate Crowe, PhD student, Faculty of Education, CSU.

As part of my presentation I discussed practices of effective supervisors (based on James and Baldwin, 1999) that required special consideration when working with part-time distance students (see asterisked points):

"FOUNDATIONS

1.Ensure partnership is right for project

2.*Get to know students and carefully assess their needs

3.*Establish reasonable, agreed expectations

4.Work with students to establish a strong conceptual structure and research plan

MOMENTUM

5. Encourage students to write early and often

6. *Initiate regular contact and provide high quality feedback

7. *Get students into the life of the department

8. Inspire and motivate

9. *Help if academic and personal crises crop up

FINAL STAGES

10. Take an active interest in students’ future careers

11. Carefully monitor the final production and presentation of the research"

James, R., & Baldwin, G. (1999). Eleven practices of effective postgraduate supervisors. Parkville VIC: University of Melbourne.

Children's books in languages other than English

As part of my Future Fellowship research I have collected many children's books written in languages other than English. I have been considering the vocabulary, illustrations, and conventions used by authors, illustrators and publishers in different cultures. This weekend I found a wonderful bookshop in Sydney that specializes in Japanese and Chinese books (including extensive children's book sections). It is called Kinokuniya, and think I will be visiting it again.

Japanese books are traditionally opened from right to left and written from top to bottom. However, many contemporary Japanese children's books are opened from left to right, and are written horizontally to mirror English conventions.

Dr Yvonne Wren's visit

Over Easter Dr Yvonne Wren and her family visited Bathurst. I have worked with Yvonne in Bristol on a number of occasions, and we have worked in many other cities in the world on days before or after conferences. So, it was wonderful to have her visit my home this time. Yvonne and I have been working on a paper based on analysis of the ALSPAC longitudinal data set. We also discussed her development, computerisation and testing of Phoneme Factory Phonology Screener.

Sharynne and Yvonne exploring Bathurst

A kangaroo near the entrance of Charles Sturt University

Just published: Intelligibility in Context Scale

The following manuscript has just been published  

 McLeod, S., Harrison, L. J. & McCormack, J.  (2012). Intelligibility in Context Scale: Validity and reliability of a subjective rating measure. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 55, 648-656.

Purpose: To describe a new measure of functional intelligibility, the Intelligibility in Context Scale (ICS), and evaluates its validity, reliability, and sensitivity using clinical measures of severity of speech sound disorder: percentage of phonemes correct (PPC), percentage of consonants correct (PCC), and percentage of vowels correct (PVC).

Method: Speech skills of 120 preschool children (109 with parent-/teacher-identified concern about how they talked and made speech sounds, and 11 with no identified concern) were assessed via the Diagnostic Evaluation of Articulation and Phonology. Parents completed the 7-item ICS questionnaire which rates the degree to which children’s speech is understood by different communication partners (parents, immediate family, extended family, friends, acquaintances, teachers, and strangers) on a 5-point scale.

Results: Parents’ ratings showed that most children were “always” (5) or “usually” (4) understood by parents, immediate family and teachers, but only “sometimes” (3) by strangers. Factor analysis confirmed the internal consistency of the ICS items; therefore, ratings were averaged to form an overall intelligibility score. The ICS had high internal reliability (α=0.93), sensitivity, and construct validity. Criterion validity was established through significant correlations between the ICS and PPC (r=.54), PCC (r=.54), and PVC (r =.36).

Conclusion: The ICS is a promising new measure of functional intelligibility. These data provide initial support for the ICS as an easily administered, valid and reliable estimate of preschool children’s intelligibility when speaking with people of varying levels of familiarity and authority.

What’s new in child language research

On Friday I attended a seminar held at the Royal Children's Hospital in Melbourne titled: "What’s new in child language research: Implications for policy and practice". The very eminent speakers were:

• Professor Bruce Tomblin, University of Iowa, USA
• Professor James Law, University of Newcastle, UK
• Professor Sheena Reilly, Murdoch Childrens Research Institute, Melbourne
• Professor Cate Taylor, Telethon Institute for Child Health Research, Perth
• Associate Professor Andrew Whitehouse, Telethon Institute for Child Health Research, Perth.
• Professor Melissa Wake, Murdoch Childrens Research Institute, Melbourne
• Dr Sharon Goldfeld from the Murdoch Childrens Research Institute, Melbourne

The day began with an inspiring lecture by Prof Tomblin reflecting on his last 40 years of research into children's language. Prof Law outlined his latest Cochrane Collaboration meta-analysis of interventions for children with speech and language impairment. Profs Reilly and Taylor described evidence of growth trajectories from longitudinal studies of children. A/Prof Whitehouse described some biological bases for language impairment. Prof Wake and Dr Goldfield outlined the results of population level intervention studies to support book reading and language stimulation in children from disadvantaged suburbs of Melbourne. Over 200 people attended this inspiring day.

Prof Bruce Tomblin

The new Royal Children's Hospital Melbourne - a space for children

International Journal of Speech-Language Pathology editorial board

I am the editor of the International Journal of Speech-Language Pathology (www.informahealthcare.com/ijslp). This week we had our annual editorial board meeting in Melbourne at the Speech Pathology Australia National Office. The executive board consists of:

• Angela Morgan (Associate editor), Murdoch Childrens Research Institute, Australia
• Chris Code - University of Exeter, UK 
• Fiona E. Gibbon - University College Cork, Ireland 
• James Law - University of Newcastle, UK 
• Suze Leitão - Curtin University of Technology, Australia 
• Malcolm R. McNeil - University of Pittsburgh, USA 
• Bruce E. Murdoch - The University of Queensland, Australia 
• Mark Onslow - The University of Sydney, Australia 
• Sheena Reilly - Royal Children’s Hospital, The University of Melbourne and Murdoch Childrens Research Institute, Australia 
• Edwin Yiu - University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong

With the acceptance of IJSLP into the Web of Science Journal Citation Index, we have seen an increase in the number of submissions to the journal. One of our topics of discussion was how to support authors and reviewers to ensure the publication of high quality research and writing. Later in the day we met with the publisher of all of informahealthcare society journals (via teleconference to Sweden). It was pleasing to hear from him that IJSLP has continued to grow in subscribers and the number of downloads. He said that this was not typical in the current economic climate.

Sharynne (Editor of IJSLP), Gail Mulcair (CEO of Speech Pathology Australia), and Dr Angela Morgan (Associate Editor of IJSLP)

The research support crew

Quality research does not occur without a quality research support crew. This morning I drove to the Wagga Wagga campus of Charles Sturt University to have meetings with:

• Prof Ken Russell and Sharon Nielsen - Quantitative Consulting Unit
• Gail Fuller - Spatial Analysis Network

about different research projects that are being undertaken as part of my Future Fellowship. One the way, I visited my PhD student's home, then arrived home to my family after 3 days away. By the time I had arrived home, I had received many emails from national and international colleagues. Colleagues, students, and family all make up the research support crew - and each contribute in their own important way.

The Rock: An important landmark between Albury and Wagga Wagga

Learning more about Australia's children via LSAC

Over the past two days I have worked with colleagues from Charles Sturt University, Queensland University of Technology, and Monash University. We all met in Albury as part of the Collaborative Research Network in Early Years Education to analyse data from the Longitudinal Study of Australian Children. LSAC has collected 4 waves of data from 10,000 Australian children, so contains a wealth of information to help us understand more about Australia's children. My focus over the two days was to work with Sarah Verdon, Sue Walker, Donna Berthelsen and Linda Harrison (primarily) to consider the extent and impact of speaking languages other than English. For example, we found that there was a significant difference between the number of children who spoke a language other than English at 2 to 3 years of age, compared with 4 to 5 years of age. We will continue to work on these data in the coming weeks and hopefully submit papers to be considered for publication. It was a very productive and collaborative two days.

Members of the Early Years Education Collaborative Research Network in Albury

Sue Walker, Donna Berthelsen and Sharynne
beside the Murray River - the border between NSW and Victoria

Mapping Australian children's access to services

Today Sarah Verdon (my PhD student) and I spoke with Simon McDonald from the Spatial Analysis Network at Charles Sturt University about mapping Australian children's cultural and linguistic diversity and their access to appropriate services. Sarah and Simon have worked together previously on Sarah's honours thesis, so we know that this collaboration is going to be very successful.

Simon McDonald (SPAN, CSU) and Sarah Verdon

Here is the abstract of a publication that arose from Sarah's honours thesis:

The World Health Organization's equity objective states that there should be equal access to healthcare for equal need, regardless of location. Disparities between health services and challenges to achieving the equity objective have been documented both in Australia and around the world. However, little is known about the extent to which this objective has been met in the field of speech-language pathology in Australia. This study used structured interviews with 74 speech-language pathologists working in rural areas of New South Wales and Victoria. The data obtained were used to develop maps to describe the availability of paediatric speech-language pathology services through consideration of location and frequency. The findings show that 98.60% of localities are unserviced at the ideal frequency of weekly or more often. It is important to note that these percentages include all localities in the represented rural areas of New South Wales and Victoria, some of which are minimally populated. The maps also depict travel and distance as barriers to the accessibility of services and have been used to suggest a critical maximum distance for paediatric outpatient speech-language pathology services in rural New South Wales and Victoria. From the data collected, 50 kilometres was suggested as the critical maximum distance past which consumers become unable or unwilling to travel to access weekly rural speech-language pathology services in rural New South Wales and Victoria. Thus, people living in almost one third of rural localities in rural New South Wales and Victoria lie beyond what is considered by rural speech-language pathologists to be a reasonable travel distance to weekly speech-language pathology services. These results highlight barriers to the achievement of equitable services in rural areas. The results also provide an essential foundation to inform policy development and assist health service planning to meet the needs of rural consumers.

Read More: http://informahealthcare.com/doi/abs/10.3109/17549507.2011.573865

The popularity of informal speech assessments: A taboo subject

The topic of the wide-spread use of unpublished/home-made/informal speech assessments is rarely discussed (or disclosed) within research literature. Most literature contains reports of the use of gold-standard assessment tools for diagnosis of children with speech difficulties and identification of appropriate intervention goals. However, recent reports using questionnaire data indicate that many speech pathologists are using unpublished/home-made/informal speech assessments. Nicole Limbrick is undertaking an analysis of the conceptualisation and operationalisation of informal speech assessments. It is interesting to see what they look like and to discover some very innovative design features in some of the assessments. Jane McCormack and I are very fortunate to be co-supervising Nicole's honours thesis. She will be presenting data from her thesis at the Speech Pathology Australia National Conference in Hobart in June.

Jane McCormack and Nicole Limbrick
considering informal speech assessments

Supporting children's speech and language development

Last night I spoke to 404 parents and teachers at 30 rural and remote schools throughout the state of New South Wales (NSW) as part of the Department of Education and Communities' NSW Country Areas Program's RDE RELATE:
"RDE RELATE  began in 2010 as a community education initiative aimed at supporting parents and community members in rural and remote areas of NSW. The aim is to support sustainability in rural and remote communities through providing access to high quality persons and topics of interest via video conferencing. Issues covered to date have canvassed a broad range of topical issues from internet safety, sexting,  to assisting your child with literacy." http://www.cap.nsw.edu.au/rde-relate

The title of my presentation was: "Supporting children's speech and language development" (not quite as controversial as some of the other topics above!). I covered how children acquire speech and language from birth into the school years. Then I talked about what parents and teachers can do to assist children's communication.

Thank you flowers!

To end my presentation I showed a video from the UK's 2011 Hello campaign: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EZ02NkT9GMY&feature=related


 

January-February 2012 summary

AUSTRALIAN RESEARCH COUNCIL FUTURE FELLOWSHIP UPDATE

‘Speaking my language: International speech acquisition in Australia’
Written by Kim Woodland, Research Institute for Professional Practice, Learning and Education for the February 2012 RIPPLE Update

Sharynne has spent time over the last few months continuing her Future Fellowship research, collaborating on other research and publication projects, and working with speech pathology students and the three doctoral students and two honours students she is supervising this year. She was recently interviewed by ABC Science online for her opinion on results from a new study that examined the ability of adults and toddlers (aged 2 and 4) to change their vowel productions based on how they perceived their own speech output. A range of media coverage has also resulted from the completion of the ‘Infants’ lives in childcare’ project, funded by the ARC, which a number of RIPPLE members were part of. Further information on the international interest this project has garnered appears in the ‘Awards and Success Stories’ section of this Update (p. 6). A project Sharynne is currently collecting data for is ‘Talking about talking: Children’s perspectives’, a project which explores typically developing young children’s perspectives about their talking and listening, with the aim of facilitating educational transition between early childhood and school settings. She also recently gave an online lecture—‘Cross-linguistic aspects of communication development’—which was appropriately broadcast across 3 continents, in 5 different time zones, and in 2 languages (it was translated into Portuguese at one of the sites). Finally, in the last RIPPLE Update, I wrote about a book that Sharynne was finalising with Brian Goldstein. The book, Multilingual aspects of speech sound disorders in children, has just been published by Multilingual Matters in the United Kingdom. For more information, please visit Sharynne’s blog: Speaking my languages.