A survey of Kansas speech-language pathologists’ knowledge and confidence regarding literacy intervention

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to examine the knowledge and confidence of Kansas school-based speech-language pathologists (SLPs) regarding literacy intervention by replicating a published survey that was conducted in the state of Virginia by Davis and Murza (2019). The study also aimed to increase the research base in the area of disciplinary literacy in Kansas and to provide information on SLPs’ provision of literacy services to students in schools, as data shows that the majority of students in Kansas are not meeting reading and writing standards. This study will then aid in the understanding of how to best serve children with language-literacy disorders in public schools. The participants of this study were 45 Kansas school-based SLPs. They were recruited through the Kansas Speech-Language-Hearing Association via an e-mail and Facebook post. Participants were asked to complete a 26-question survey that lasted about five minutes. This survey consisted of multiple choice, dropdown list, open-ended, and Likert-type scale questions. The results show that Kansas school-based SLPs are unfamiliar with the term disciplinary literacy, they desire additional training in literacy intervention, SLPs with a greater number of years of experience rate their education/training in the area of literacy more poorly, and there is a correlation between SLPs’ confidence in their ability to implement language therapy that impacts students' literacy achievement in preschool and a higher percentage of students who had IEP goals connected to literacy achievement, but there is no correlation in grades K-12th. Results of this study were compared to Davis and Murza’s study (2019). Future research should follow-up with these participants to gather qualitative results and should gather information from a larger sample.