Celeste Roseberry-McKibbin received her Ph.D. from Northwestern University.She is a Professor of Speech Pathologyand Audiology at California State University, Sacramento.Dr. Roseberry is also currently a part-time itinerant speech pathologist in Elk Grove Unified School District where she provides direct services to elementary students.She has worked in educational and medical settings with a wide variety of clients ranging from preschoolers through geriatric patients.

Dr. Roseberry's primary research interests are in the areas of assessment and treatment of multicultural students with communication disorders as well as language skills of children from low-income backgrounds.She has over 50 publications, including six books, and has made over 180 presentations at the state, national, and international levels.Dr. Roseberry isa Fellow of ASHA. She lived in the Philippines from ages 6 to 17.

1. How did you become interested in the topic of working with low-income children to increase their linguistic and academic success?

**When I was 3 and my next sister was 2, my mother had twins. There were 4 children ages 3 and under within a 3-year time span! At the time, my father worked as a minister earning $300.00 a month for his family of 6. There were times when all we had in the fridge was mustard and katsup. That was my first, very early introduction to poverty.

My parents were missionaries in the Philippines for 10 years. I lived there from ages 6-17 (with 6^th grade in the U.S.). Growing up in this lovely, developing nation gave me a great deal of first-hand experience with poverty.

I also work as not only a professor, but a public school itinerant speech pathologist. Over time, I have worked with many low-SES (socioeconomic status) children from diverse cultural and linguistic backgrounds. I see so many common issues in these children, and so very much that needs to be done to help them to grow up to be productive, happy citizens.

2. How can we help these children? Isit enough to begin providing extra support when low-SES children come to kindergarten and enter the public school system?

No. Research conclusively supports the fact that even if children begin preschool at age 3 or 4 years, the proverbial horse may already be out of the barn. These children can still be helped, of course, but support needs to begin in infancy—ideally, within the very first months of life.

The research of Hart and Risley from Kansas compared children from 3 groups: 1) welfare, 2) blue collar/working class, and 3) white collar/professional. The results of their extensive longitudinal study found that among other things, by 3 years of age, the difference in the vocabulary knowledge between children from welfare and professional homes was so great that in order for the welfare children to gain a vocabulary equivalent to that of children from blue collar homes, these welfare children would need to attend a preschool program for 40 hours a week where they heard language at a level used in the homes of professional families.

Again, we need to begin enrichment in infancy.

3. In terms of specific support, what exactly can be done?

We can work with caregivers, giving them inexpensive and easy-to-implement techniques that stimulate infants' and children's oral and pre-literate language skills. We can support funding for programs like Early Head Start, which provide cognitive and linguistic stimulation to babies and very young children from low-SES homes.

4. How about when the children reach school age?

We can encourage the development of all-day kindergartens as well as after-school and summer programs. We can provide peer tutors and extra academic support in the classroom setting. All these supplemental services have been proven to be quite effective.

One tenacious problem in our educational system is that low-SES children are over-referred for special education. Many of them do not really require special education, because they do not have disabilities. What they do have is impoverished language backgrounds, and they require additional support to "catch up" with the oral and written language expectations of the schools. Again, we can provide extra supports to help these students gain enough skills to succeed in school.

5. Are there any "cultural" issues that impact low-SES children?

Yes. Some people don't like the term "culture of poverty," but it really does sum up the issues that many low-SES children bring to school. For example, in many low-SES homes characterized by generational poverty, there is an attitude of instant gratification, living for today, being entertained, and not worrying about tomorrow. Children and parents from these homes often do not see the value of academic success, literacy, and preparing for a career which involves a college education. Thus, homework may not be returned. Parent conferences and IEP meetings may not be attended. Students' motivation to work hard may be low, because why try? It's not going to do any good anyway. I think that for us as educators, this attitude presents one of the biggest challenges that we face.

6. What about supporting the caregivers of low-SES children?

At the risk of sounding too colloquial, I believe many of us view these children's caregivers as a "lost cause." In some cases, this may be true. But I have found that often, the caregivers need as much support as the children do. We can help them find services such as those that provide medical care and food stamps. We can provide support groups that teach them not only how to increase their children's language skills, buthow to implement positive parenting techniques (e.g., using reasoning and verbal problem-solving instead of slapping and spanking).

7. Sometimes the issues represented by our nation's low-SES children in the schools seem overwhelming. What can we do to specifically support these students in addition to the things you have already mentioned?

The support has to come from three levels. First, our federal and state governments must provide funding and programs at a grass-roots level. Second, school districts and individual schools must access these programs and this funding to provide extra support for low-SES children. Third, we as individuals can dedicate our time and efforts to serving as role models and mentors for low-SES children, providing them not only with the education they need, but with the emotional support and encouragement they require to move from poverty to middle class. For most low-SES children, our ability and willingness to invest ourselves in serving as role models and mentors is their greatest hope for a better life.

Published November 26, 2007