Impact of professional development on preschool teachers’ conversational responsivity and children's linguistic productivity and complexity

The present study investigated the effect of professional development (PD) on preschool teachers’ conversational responsivity in the classroom, defined as teachers’ use of strategies to promote children's participation in extended conversational exchanges (communication-facilitating strategies) and exposure to advanced linguistic models (language-developing strategies), and the resultant impact on proximal child language outcomes. We randomly-assigned 49 preschool teachers to receive 15–20 h of such PD (PD; n = 25) or to a comparison condition (n = 24). Growth curve analysis indicated that trained teachers used significantly more communication-facilitating strategies across the year but no such difference for language-developing strategies. Moreover, children in these classrooms showed greater linguistic productivity and complexity in their talk. These findings suggest that PD may alter some aspects of teachers’ conservational responsivity responsible for increasing the amount and complexity of child language. Alteration of some strategies, however, may require more intensive PD efforts.

► We examined the efficacy of providing responsivity education to preschool teachers. ► Teachers were randomly assigned to treatment or control. ► Teachers’ use of responsivity strategies was monitored over an entire academic year. ► Treatment led to more use of communication-facilitating strategies in classrooms. ► Treatment did not impact teachers’ use of language-developing strategies.