Individualized Narrative Intervention for School-Age Children With Specific Language Impairment

Purpose: This study extends the research on narrative intervention by evaluating the effect of a standard treatment protocol, Story Champs (Petersen & Spencer, 2012), on personal narrative generations of school-age children with specific language impairment (SLI). Method: Four second-grade, 8- to 9-year-old boys with SLI participated in this multiple baseline across behaviors, single-case design study that was repeated across participants. Each one-on-one intervention session involved eight steps across two intervention segments: story retell and personal story generation. The interventionist provided systematic scaffolding (visual and verbal supports) that was faded within each session. Three individualized story grammar elements per participant were targeted sequentially across the weeks of intervention based on each participant's needs identified in baseline. The dependent variable probe (personal narrative generation) was administered at the beginning of each twice-weekly session, and individualized story grammar elements were scored on a 4-point rubric (dependent variable). Results: In this single-case research design study, a functional relation was evaluated for each participant (i.e., replication of an effect across three story grammar elements). A functional relation between Story Champs intervention and the dependent variable was observed for two participants. Conclusion: Results provide preliminary evidence for the efficacy of individually administered Story Champs intervention for children with SLI.