Comparing guided, dialogic, and sign language instruction in deaf and hard-of-hearing students' narrative comprehension
- 1Department of Special Education, Faculty of Education, Zonguldak Bulent Ecevit University , ,
Abstract
Purpose: This study compared guided reading, dialogic reading, and sign language instruction for improving narrative comprehension among deaf and hard-of-hearing (DHH) students and examined teachers' perceptions of students' engagement and comprehension processes.
Methods: A mixed-methods design was conducted in Türkiye with 30 DHH middle school students enrolled in Grades 6 and 7. Students were assigned to guided reading, dialogic reading, or sign language instruction groups (n = 10 per group). The 8-week intervention used narrative texts and a common story-map framework addressing setting, time, characters, problem, solution, outcome, reaction, and main idea. Students' comprehension was assessed at baseline, weekly during instruction, immediately after the intervention, and 1 week later. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with six teachers.
Results: All three groups demonstrated significant improvement over time, but the trajectories differed. Dialogic reading produced earlier and larger gains in higher-level narrative comprehension, particularly for problem, outcome, and main idea. At follow-up, both the dialogic reading and Sign Language Instruction groups outperformed the guided reading group on total comprehension (three-group omnibus test; ε2 = 0.75); the dialogic reading and Sign Language Instruction groups did not differ significantly from one another. Teachers described greater participation, elaborated responses, and increased attention to relationships among narrative events during dialogic reading.
Conclusions: Accessible linguistic and visual supports may provide a common foundation for narrative comprehension, whereas dialogic interaction may offer additional opportunities for explanation, prediction, causal reasoning, and integration of narrative information.
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BibTeX
@article{ugurlu2026comparing,
title = {{Comparing guided, dialogic, and sign language instruction in deaf and hard-of-hearing students' narrative comprehension}},
author = {Necla Işıkdoğan Uğurlu},
journal = {Frontiers in psychology},
year = {2026},
month = oct,
doi = {10.3389/fpsyg.2026.1982563},
url = {https://europepmc.org/article/PMC/PMC13727612},
note = {CC BY},
}
RIS
TY - JOUR
TI - Comparing guided, dialogic, and sign language instruction in deaf and hard-of-hearing students' narrative comprehension
AU - Necla Işıkdoğan Uğurlu
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/10/20
JO - Frontiers in psychology
DO - 10.3389/fpsyg.2026.1982563
UR - https://europepmc.org/article/PMC/PMC13727612
AB - Purpose: This study compared guided reading, dialogic reading, and sign language instruction for improving narrative comprehension among deaf and hard-of-hearing (DHH) students and examined teachers' perceptions of students' engagement and comprehension processes. Methods: A mixed-methods design was conducted in Türkiye with 30 DHH middle school students enrolled in Grades 6 and 7. Students were assigned to guided reading, dialogic reading, or sign language instruction groups (n = 10 per group). The 8-week intervention used narrative texts and a common story-map framework addressing setting, time, characters, problem, solution, outcome, reaction, and main idea. Students' comprehension was assessed at baseline, weekly during instruction, immediately after the intervention, and 1 week later. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with six teachers. Results: All three groups demonstrated significant improvement over time, but the trajectories differed. Dialogic reading produced earlier and larger gains in higher-level narrative comprehension, particularly for problem, outcome, and main idea. At follow-up, both the dialogic reading and Sign Language Instruction groups outperformed the guided reading group on total comprehension (three-group omnibus test; ε2 = 0.75); the dialogic reading and Sign Language Instruction groups did not differ significantly from one another. Teachers described greater participation, elaborated responses, and increased attention to relationships among narrative events during dialogic reading. Conclusions: Accessible linguistic and visual supports may provide a common foundation for narrative comprehension, whereas dialogic interaction may offer additional opportunities for explanation, prediction, causal reasoning, and integration of narrative information.
SN - 1664-1078
ER -