The effect of mediated story retelling on the development of listening comprehension, story structure and oral language in young children with learning disabilities

There is an ongoing need to find effective strategies to assist children with learning disabilities in the development of literacy skills.;Past evidence has demonstrated that story retelling experiences have a positive effect on the development of literacy skills in kindergarten children, while other studies have demonstrated a positive effect upon reading comprehension with normal and less proficient readers. The emerging body of research suggests that providing children with an opportunity to verbally reconstruct stories enables them to organize and make better use of their processing capacities. Children with learning disabilities have been found to be deficient in active processing strategies, and use of organizational structures. Researchers have suggested that adults can act as mediators, by providing verbal, structural and contextual information to assist in the remediation of these deficiencies.;This study examined the effects of mediated story retelling on story structure, listening comprehension, and oral language. It was predicted that children would include more structural elements in their retellings and original stories, and improve in listening comprehension and oral language.;Subjects were 24 children, age five through seven with learning disabilities, selected from six special education classrooms, who were randomly assigned to an experimental or control group. Treatments were administered twelve times within an eight week period. After listening to stories, children in the experimental group were asked to retell with an adult who offered assistance and support, while emphasizing story structure elements. An interactive, conversational context was created between adult and child. Children in the control group listened to the same stories and drew a picture about the story.;Pre- and posttests assessed listening comprehension, story structure knowledge and oral language. A two sample t test of difference scores indicated significant improvement in listening comprehension, story structure and use of story structure when creating original stories. Significant improvements were not found in oral language.;An analysis of observational data helped to uncover the nature of the mediation processes and changes that occurred over time.;Mediated retelling proved to be a strategy capable of improving literacy skills in young children with learning disabilities.