"Documenting the Home and Community Storytelling Practices of Mexican-American Bilingual Children with Developmental Language Disorder" aims to center language, literacy practices of linguistically marginalized communities
Embarking this summer on the two-year fellowship, Alejandro Granados Vargas seeks to inform culturally relevant assessment and intervention practices.
By Carol Jean Tomoguchi-Perez
February 21, 2024 Third-year doctoral student Alejandro Granados Vargas was awarded a two-year, $81.4K fellowship through the Ruth L. Kirschstein National Research Award Individual Predoctoral Fellowship through the National Institutes of Health (NIH). Through his work on "Documenting the Home and Community Storytelling Practices of Mexican-American Bilingual Children with Developmental Language Disorder," Granados Vargas will research the home language and literacy practices of Latinx children with developmental language disorder to inform culturally relevant assessment and intervention practices. “My goal for this research is to de-center the perspective of white, (formally) educated, industrialized, democratic language and literacy standards and, instead, center the actual language and literacy practices of linguistically marginalized communities,” Granados Vargas said. He is the PI and will be working with his advisor, Professor Elizabeth Peña, who will serve as his sponsor. |
Starting in June 2024, Granados Vargas plans to spend the first year of the fellowship recruiting and generating data with families, and analyzing the data. He will spend the second year writing up his findings and presenting my analyses at conferences, schools, community spaces, and anywhere else education, language, and literacy may be relevant.
"‘Documenting the Home and Community Storytelling Practices of Mexican-American Bilingual Children with Developmental Language Disorder’ builds upon previous research that has focused on home literacy practices, such as Shirley Bryce Heath's 1982 ‘What no bedtimes story means: Narrative skills at home and school’ where Heath describes the language and literacy practices of white and Black rural communities from various socioeconomic backgrounds,” Granado Vargas explained. “Additionally, this work will also build on Silva & McCabe's (1996) description of what they call ‘Latino Storytelling Traditions’ and Reese's (2012) description of storytelling in Mexican homes.”
"This study will add a disability focus and update the types of literacy practices these communities may be engaging in in the current day."
"‘Documenting the Home and Community Storytelling Practices of Mexican-American Bilingual Children with Developmental Language Disorder’ builds upon previous research that has focused on home literacy practices, such as Shirley Bryce Heath's 1982 ‘What no bedtimes story means: Narrative skills at home and school’ where Heath describes the language and literacy practices of white and Black rural communities from various socioeconomic backgrounds,” Granado Vargas explained. “Additionally, this work will also build on Silva & McCabe's (1996) description of what they call ‘Latino Storytelling Traditions’ and Reese's (2012) description of storytelling in Mexican homes.”
"This study will add a disability focus and update the types of literacy practices these communities may be engaging in in the current day."