Medicine and Health Sciences Commons^™

Everyday Speech Production Assessment Measure (E-Spam): Reliability And Validity, Tracy N. Watts

University of Kentucky Master's Theses

Purpose: The Everyday Speech Production Assessment Measure (E-SPAM) is a novel test for assessing changes in clients‟ speech production skills after intervention. This study provides information on reliability and validity for the test and overviews its clinical application.

Method & Procedures: E-SPAM, oral reading, and sequential motion rate tasks were administered to 15 participants with motor speech disorders (MSDs). E-SPAM responses were scored using a 5-point system by four graduate students to assess inter-scorer and temporal reliability and to determine validity for E-SPAM.

Results: Findings of this study indicate that the E-SPAM can be scored with sufficient …

Analysis Of Student & Teacher Outcomes From Pre-Existing Data Obtained Through The Low Incidence Initiative: Teaching Academic Age-Appropriate Learning Via Communication Project, April M. Holman

University of Kentucky Master's Theses

Students with significant cognitive disabilities frequently exhibit reduced communicative and academic competence. The Low Incidence Initiative (LII) project was a professional development model designed to train school-based teams to facilitate increased communicative and academic competence with such students via distance-technology coaching. This study analyzed pre-existing data from year one of the LII. Data were analyzed to determine effectiveness of the project on communication status of students and on training school personnel to accurately identify student levels of communication, and for overall satisfaction with the project. Results indicated that all student participants demonstrated improvement in expressive communication output. 100% of students …