<div dir="ltr"><div>I think they'd question the empirical basis for that claim. It's usually cited to Hart & Risley 1995, which as I mentioned is a highly flawed piece of work. Here's a thorough critical response to it: <a href="http://academic.evergreen.edu/curricular/med/LangPoor.pdf">http://academic.evergreen.edu/curricular/med/LangPoor.pdf</a> There's a lot there in a relatively short article, but here's a key quote for this discussion: <br></div><br><blockquote style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex" class="gmail_quote">Many educational researchers and policy makers have generalized the findings about the language and culture of the 6 welfare families in Hart and Risley’s study to all poor families. Yet, Hart and Risley offer no compelling reason to believe that the poor families they studied have much in common with poor families in other communities, or even in Kansas City for that matter. The primary selection criterion for participation in this study was socioeconomic status; therefore, all the 6 welfare families had in common was income, a willingness to participate in the study, race (all the welfare families were Black), and geography (all lived in the Kansas City area). Families living in poverty are, however, an ethnically, linguistically, and racially diverse group (US Census Bureau, 2003). Strong claims about the language and culture of families living in poverty based on a sample of 6 Black welfare families living in Kansas City are unwarranted. (p. 364)<br></blockquote></div><div class="gmail_extra"><br clear="all"><div><div class="gmail_signature"><div dir="ltr"><div>--<br>Daniel Ginsberg<br>Doctoral candidate, Linguistics<br>Georgetown University<br></div><a href="http://georgetown.academia.edu/DanielGinsberg" target="_blank">http://georgetown.academia.edu/DanielGinsberg</a><br></div></div></div>
<br><div class="gmail_quote">On Wed, Sep 16, 2015 at 4:22 AM, Richard Hudson <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:r.hudson@ucl.ac.uk" target="_blank">r.hudson@ucl.ac.uk</a>></span> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex">
<div bgcolor="#FFFFFF" text="#000000">
<font face="Times New Roman, Times, serif">Hello again Daniel.
Thanks for the interesting link. Would you agree that even these
researchers accept that poor children reach school with fewer
words than rich children?<br>
<br>
Dick Hudson <br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
</font><div><div class="h5"><br>
<div>On 15/09/2015 21:51, Daniel Ginsberg
wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote type="cite">
<div dir="ltr">There was an invited forum in Jnl Ling Anth earlier
this year that debunked a lot of this "word gap" discourse. I
would love to see more public awareness of this, and less
uncritical citation of the highly flawed Hart & Risley
study.<br>
<br>
<a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/jola.12071/full" target="_blank">http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/jola.12071/full</a><br>
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<div class="gmail_extra"><br clear="all">
<div>
<div>
<div dir="ltr">
<div>--<br>
Daniel Ginsberg<br>
Doctoral candidate, Linguistics<br>
Georgetown University<br>
</div>
<a href="http://georgetown.academia.edu/DanielGinsberg" target="_blank">http://georgetown.academia.edu/DanielGinsberg</a><br>
</div>
</div>
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<br>
<div class="gmail_quote">On Tue, Sep 15, 2015 at 7:27 AM,
Francis Hult <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:francis.hult@englund.lu.se" target="_blank">francis.hult@englund.lu.se</a>></span>
wrote:<br>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex">
<div>
<div style="direction:ltr;font-family:Arial;color:#000000;font-size:10pt">
<p>[Moderator's note: I post this story because it
relates to a discourse that is gaining public
traction. I am reminded of an article that was
recently posted to Edling:</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Johnson, E.J. (2015) Debunking the “language gap”. <em>Journal
for Multicultural Education, 9</em>(1), 42-50.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>I wonder what perspectives list members working in
different research traditions have on this topic.
What additional research findings and ideas should
we be getting out to the public and how? FMH] </p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
<p>The Atlantic</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Why Boosting Poor Children’s Vocabulary Is Important
for Public Health</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Research suggests that poor children hear about
600 words per hour, while affluent children hear
2,000. By age 4, a poor child has a listening
vocabulary of about 3,000 words, while a wealthier
child wields a 20,000-word listening vocabulary. So
it’s no surprise that poor children tend to enter
kindergarten already behind their wealthier peers.
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>But it’s not just the poverty that holds them
back—it’s the lack of words. In fact, the single-best
predictor of a child’s academic success is not
parental education or socioeconomic status, but
rather the quality and quantity of the words that a
baby hears during his or her first three years.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Full story:<br>
<a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2015/09/georgias-plan-to-close-the-30-million-word-gap-for-kids/403903/" target="_blank">http://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2015/09/georgias-plan-to-close-the-30-million-word-gap-for-kids/403903/</a></p>
</div>
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</div></div><span class="HOEnZb"><font color="#888888"><pre cols="72">--
Richard Hudson (<a href="http://dickhudson.com" target="_blank">dickhudson.com</a>)</pre>
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