Oral Language Intervention Programs for Preschool-aged Children: A Systematic Literature Review

Oral language skills are the foundation of literacy skills. High risk of educational underachievement must be addressed before difficulties appear. Preschool oral language programs seek to implement evidence-based practices to support literacy development in the early years. The purpose of this review is to provide an overview of oral language intervention programs for preschool-aged children delivered by trained teaching assistants using a Randomized Controlled Trial design (RCT). A literature review was conducted by searching electronic databases up to January 2019, and the relevant studies identified were then analyzed. Twelve articles were included in the analysis. The duration of interventions programs varied from 15 to 30 weeks. Most of the studies reported a small to moderate or a moderate to large effect size from an oral language and/or early literacy intervention program. The review highlights several components and challenges of early language interventions delivered by trained teaching assistants for young children