Speech and language program for the development of literacy: reading comprehension efficacy in school children

Abstract

Background: The expected end product as formal elementary education is completed is primarily a satisfactory level of reading comprehension skills, which is required to mediate text-based learning in other school subjects. However, statistics show that a large number of students finish elementary school with substantial deficits in reading comprehension. Objective: To investigate the effectiveness of a Speech and Language Program for the Development of Literacy (PFPL) in improving the reading comprehension skills of schoolchildren in the fourth grade of elementary school in Belo Horizonte. Methods: The study was approved by the Research Ethics Committee of the institution. A convenience sample of two classes of fourth grade elementary school students was selected. The students in the class that participated in the PFPL constituted the case group while the students in the non-PFPL class comprised the control group. At the end of the research, this group received the same intervention the case group. The PFPL included activities of shared reading, scaffolding strategies, and collective discursive construction, in addition to phonological and spelling processing tasks. Results: The performance of the groups was comparable on initial assessment, with high prevalence of children with reading comprehension difficulties. Following the PFPL, the reading comprehension performance of the case group children improved significantly whereas the performance of the control group was  unchanged. Conclusion: The PFPL was effective in improving the schoolchildren’s reading comprehension skills.