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Narrative language abilities are foundational to literacy development and are a culturally grounded measure of early literacy for Latino children. This study evaluates the impacts on narrative language abilities and the costs of a 4-week, strengths-based program that leverages two valued sociocultural practices with built-in benefits, personal narratives, and family food routines (e.g., grocery shopping), for improving Latino kindergarteners' learning outcomes in the United States. Two-hundred and 34 children (M age = 67 months; 51% girls; 13 schools) and their parents participated in a cluster randomized trial. Children produced personal narratives at three time points: pretest, end-of-treatment, and 5-month follow-up. Four narrative features were measured: narrative coherence, elaborations, word types, and literate language features. Large positive impacts were observed on all four narrative features at the end-of-treatment posttest (d = 1.21-1.76). There was suggestive evidence of moderate impacts on one narrative feature (i.e., narrative coherence) at the 5-month follow-up (d = .59). The costs required to implement the family program were relatively low. Findings highlight the potential value of implementing this strengths-based program in schools serving Latino kindergarteners using a rigorous evaluation of its effectiveness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although preterm infants are at risk for social deficits, interventions to improve mother--infant interaction in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) are not part of standard care (SC). Study participants were a subset from a randomized controlled trial of a new intervention for premature infants, the Family Nurture Intervention (FNI), designed to help mothers and infants establish an emotional connection. At infants' 4 months corrected age, mother--infant face-to-face interaction was filmed and coded on a 1-s time base for mother touch, infant vocal affect, mother gaze, and infant gaze. Time-series models assessed self- and interactive contingency. Comparing FNI to SC dyads, FNI mothers showed more touch and calmer touch patterns, and FNI infants showed more angry-protest but less cry. In maternal touch self-contingency, FNI mothers were more likely to sustain positive touch and to repair moments of negative touch by transitioning to positive touch. In maternal touch interactive contingency, when infants looked at mothers, FNI mothers were likely to respond with more positive touch. In infant vocal affect self-contingency, FNI infants were more likely to sustain positive vocal affect and to transition from negative to positive vocal affect. In maternal gaze interactive contingency, following infants' looking at mother, FNI mothers of male infants were more likely to look at their sons. In maternal gaze self-contingency, following mothers' looking away, FNI mothers of male infants were more likely to look at their sons. Documentation of positive effects of the FNI for 4-month mother-infant face-to-face communication is useful clinically and has important implications for an improved developmental trajectory of these infants. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]