Monitoring oral language development in young children

Psychometric evaluation of a learning progress assessment

Bibliographic Data

ID23312574
AuthorsMelanie Besca (Ludwigsburg University of Education, corresponding author), Marco Ennemoser (Ludwigsburg University of Education)
Year2026
Volume5
Publication date2026-07-29
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueFrontiers in Language Sciences (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 2813-4605 • E-ISSN: 2813-4605
PublisherFrontiers Media SA (PUBLISHER • CH)
DOI10.3389/flang.2026.1799931
OpenAlexW7171663453
LanguageEN
References cited45

Introduction Learning Progress Assessments (LPA) are widely used to monitor individual progress in various domains, enabling the continuous adjustment of interventions as needed. Although LPAs are well-established in areas such as reading and mathematics, there is a lack of tools specifically designed to assess oral language development and in early childhood education. To address this gap, two studies were conducted to provide initial evidence for the psychometric properties of a newly developed LPA. This tool aims to assess progress in oral language development in monolingual and multilingual kindergarten children aged 4–6 years. Methods Since progress assessments rely on the use of multiple test versions, 11 parallel tests were developed based on the sentence repetition task. In the first study, a cross-sectional design was used, where 87 children completed the parallel tests within 2 weeks. In the second study, a longitudinal design was applied, involving 88 children who completed the parallel tests at 4-week intervals over a period of 6 months. Results and Discussion The results from the studies indicated that the parallel tests had similar levels of difficulty and provided reliable and valid global measures of children's language abilities. Confirmatory factor analyses supported the LPA's one-dimensional structure. Moreover, repeated-measures analyses and a latent growth curve model provide initial evidence of the LPA's sensitivity to change, particularly for children with lower initial language abilities.

Confirmatory factor analysis · Language acquisition · Language assessment · Language development · Psychological intervention · Psychometrics · Reading (process) · Test (biology) · Educational and Psychological Assessments · Language Development and Disorders · Reading and Literacy Development

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