Ch. 4: Language Disorders in Children Flashcards
Specific Language Impairment (SLI)/Language-Learning Disability (LLD)
Language disorders in children who are otherwise typically developing. Impairment is specific only to language. No known etiology or association. Often associated with speech sound problems. Often late talkers with a slow rate of vocabulary acquisition. Often demonstrate overextension, underextension, and word-finding problems.
Overextension
E.g., calling all adult males “Daddy”
Underextension
E.g., a child may only call the family pet “dog” and fail to use the term for other dogs
Intellectual Disability
Characterized by significant limitations both in intellectual functioning and in adaptive behavior as expressed in conceptual, social, and practical adaptive skills. The disability originates before the age of 18. A diagnosis is based on subaverage IQ scores. Limited communication skills is a significant feature.
Autism Spectrum Disorder/Pervasive Developmental Disorder
Diagnostic criteria includes impaired social interaction, disturbed communication, and stereotypic patterns of behavior, interests, and activities. Typically diagnosed before age 3. Characterized by generally below-average intelligence, lack of responsiveness to and awareness of other people, preference for solitude and objects rather than people, lack of interest in nonverbal and verbal communication, stereotypic body movements such as constant rocking, insistence on routines and strong dislike of change, dislike of being touched or held, self-injurious behaviors such as head banging, unusual talent in some area, seizures (in 25% of children), and hypo- or hypersensitivity to sensory stimulation.
Focal Injury
Injury restricted to one area of the brain.
Diffuse Injury
Injury to the brain that is widespread and involves multiple areas.
Cerebral Palsy
A disorder of early childhood in which the immature nervous system is affected. This results is muscular incoordination and associated problems. Associated problems may invude orthopedic abnormalities, seizures, feeding difficulties, hearing loss, perceptual disturbances, and intellectual deficits, however not all children with the disorder have these problems. Not a progressive disease and generally occurs following a brain injury.
Prenatal Brain Injury
Injury to the brain of a fetus due to maternal rubella, mumps, accidents, or other factors.
Perinatal Brain Injury
Brain injury due to difficulties in the birth process such as prolonged labor, prematurity, or breech delivery.
Postnatal Brain Injury
Brain injury due to anoxia, accidents, infections, and diseases such as scarlet fever and meningitis.
Hemiplegia
One side of the body is paralyzed.
Paraplegia
Only the legs and lower trunk are paralyzed.
Monoplegia
Only one limb (or part of that limb) are paralyzed.
Diplegia
Either two legs or two arms are paralyzed.
Quadriplegia
All four limbs are paralyzed.
Ataxic CP
CP which involves disturbed balance, awkward gate, and uncoordinated movements (due to cerebellar damage).
Athetoid CP
CP which is characterized by slow, writhing, involuntary movements (due to damage to the indirect motor pathways, especially the basal ganglia).
Spastic CP
CP which involves increased spasticity (increased tone, rigidity of the muscles) as well as stiff, abrupt, jerky, slow movements (due to damage to the motor cortex or direct motor pathways).
NA
Neglect and abuse.
Fetal Alcohol Syndrome (FAS)
A pattern of mental, physical, and behavioral defects that develop in infants born to some women who drink heavily during the pregnancy. A leading cause of intellectual disabilities in the Western world. Characterized by pre- and postnatal growth problems, microcephaly, CNS dysfunction, abnormal craniofacial features, malformations of major organ systems, behavior problems, hyperactivity, ADD, poor play and social skills, learning and academic problems, poor reading and writing skills, speech problems and articulation delay, swallowing problems, impaired sucking at birth, language delay, cognitive problems (reasoning, memory, learning), auditory processing problems, and hearing problems.
Fetal Alcohol Effects (FAE)
Signs that have been linked to the mother’s drinking during pregnancy. E.g., mild physical and cognitive deficits
Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD)
Manifests in language and auditory processing problems. Children have chronic difficulties in the areas of impulsivity, attention, and overactivity to a degree inappropriate to their age and developmental level. Children are more likely to receive lower grades in academic subjects and over half of children with this disorder will fail at least one grade by adolescence. Children tend to experience the most difficulty in auditory processing and social interaction skills.
Language Sampling
A measure of communication skills is vital to a diagnosis of language disorders in children. This is a procedure of recording a student’s language under relatively typical, and appropriate for the client, conditions, which usually involve conversation.
Mean Length of Utterance (MLU)
Number of morphemes / Number of utterances. Allows the clinician to identify the presence or absence of Brown’s 14 grammatical morphemes.
Type-Token Ratio (TTR)
Number of different words in sample / Number of words in sample. Represents the variety of different words the child uses expressively, thus assessing the child’s semantic or lexical skills.
P.L. 99-457 Preschool Amendments to the Education of the Handicapped Act of 1986
Public law that provided incentives at the state and federal levels for SLPs to identify and treat infants and toddlers with established risk of language disorders or who experience conditions that put them at risk for developing language disorders.
Factors in Established Risk of Developing Language Disorders
Factors include congenital malformations, genetic syndromes, atypical developmental disorders, sensory disorders, neurological disorders, metabolic disorders, chronic illnesses, severe infectious diseases, and severe toxic exposure.
Factors putting children At Risk for Language Disorders
Factors include serious prenatal and natal complications, early signs of behavior disorders, child’s tendency toward frequent and unusual accidents, chronic middle ear infections, family history of predisposing genetic or medical conditions, chronic or severe physical illness, mental illness or intellectual disabilities in the primary caregiver or both parents, serious questions raised by a professional, parent, or caregiver about the child’s development, chronically dysfunctional interaction between members of the family, caregiver or parental substance abuse, history of substance abuse, parental education below 9th grade, parental unemployment, chronic welfare dependency, isolation of the child or separation of the child from the primary caregiver or parent, unstable or dangerous living conditions (e.g., homelessness), and lack of health insurance, poor family health care, or inadequate prenatal care.
C-Units
Communication units. Contain an independent clause and a subordinate clause. May be incomplete sentences produced in response to questions.
T-Units
Terminable units. Contain an independent clause and a subordinate clause.
Discrete Trial Procedure
Clinician places a picture in front of the child (e.g., a picture of two cups) and asks the child a relevant question (e.g., “What do you see?”). Clinician immediately models the correct response for the child (e.g., “Say, ‘Two cups’”) and waits for a few seconds for the child to imitate the modeled response. Clinician reinforces the child for correct imitation and gives corrective feedback if the child missed the target response.
Shaping
A procedure in which a complex response is broken down into smaller components that are taught sequentially to achieve the final target skill.
Manual Guidance
Involves offering physical assistance to produce a response. E.g., after asking the child to point to a picture, the clinician may take the child’s hand and point to the correct picture.
Expansion
Clinician expands a child’s telegraphic or incomplete utterance into a more grammatically complete utterance. E.g., child says, “Doggy bark” and clinician says, “Yes, look at the doggy barking.”
Extension
Clinician comments on the child’s utterances and adds new and relevant information. E.g., child says, “Play ball” and clinician says, “Yes, you are playing with a big, red, plastic ball that bounces.”
Focused Stimulation
Clinician repeatedly models a target structure to stimulate the child to use it (e.g., the plural morpheme –s). Clinician uses various stimulus materials, talks about them, and repeatedly models the plural constructions (e.g., “Look, here are two pigs. I see two pigs here. Over there are some boys playing. They boys are drinking from cups. The cups have flowers on them.”) Clinician does not correct the child’s incorrect responses, but instead models the correct target.
Milieu Teaching
Method that teaches functional communication skills through the use of typical, everyday verbal interactions that arise naturally. Uses effective behavioral procedures in naturalistic settings. Includes incidental teaching, mand-model, and time delay methods.
Incidental Teaching
In this method, the adult who waits for the child to initiate a verbal response pays full joint attention to the stimulus that prompted a response from the child, prompts an elaboration of the response, then praises the child and hands them the desired object.
Mand-Model
A variation of the incidental teaching method that teaches language through the use of typical adult-child interactions in a play-oriented setting. The clinician, using attractive stimulus materials, designs a naturalistic interactive situation. He or she then establishes joint clinician-client attention to a particular material (e.g., a set of paints). The clinician then mands (e.g., commands) a response from the child. If the child gives no or a limited response, the clinician models the complete, correct response.
Time Delay Method
In this procedure, the clinician waits for the child to initiate verbal responses in relation to stimuli that are separated by a predetermined waiting period. Without prompting a response, the clinician looks at the child expectantly for at least 15 seconds. If the child does not initiate, the clinician prompts a response or models it. The clinician gives the desired object when the child imitate, spontaneously requests, or fails to say anything after three models each separated by 15 seconds.
Narratives
Speakers’ descriptions of events (episodes, stories) and experiences. Should be produced in a cohesive, logically consistent, temporally sequenced manner. Part of pragmatic language skills.
Elements of Story Grammar
Elements include setting statements, initiating events, internal response, theme of the story, goals of the characters, attempts, direct consequences, and the conclusion.
Parallel Talk
Clinician plays with the child and describes and comments upon what the child is doing and the objects the child is interested in. For example, the clinician says, “You are putting the lady in the truck” or “That cow you have is brown and white.”
Recasting
Rephrasing children’s limited productions into longer or syntactically different forms. E.g., the child says, “The baby is hungry,” then the clinician asks, “Is the baby hungry?”
Reauditorization
The clinician repeats what the child says during language-stimulation activities. E.g., the child says, “Am swinging” and the clinician repeats that utterance.
Self-Talk
The clinician describes her own activity as she plays with the child. Using language structures that are appropriate for the child, the clinician might say something like, “Look, I’m putting the dress on the doll.”
Whole-Language Approach
The philosophical approach to language holds that learning written language should be like learning oral language. Proponents believe that children learn literacy in the same way they learn spoken language: through being immersed in a literate environment, communicating through print, and getting supportive feedback. Therefore, the approach does not involve specific language skill training.
Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC)
Methods that supplement deficient oral communication or provide alternative means of communication for people with extremely limited oral communication skills. Current approach is the revised participation model advocated by Beukelman and Mirenda (2005).
Revised Participation Model of AAC
Requires clinicians to identify communication needs of an individual through a participation inventory, assess barriers to communication imposed by others (e.g., unhelpful policies and practices), assess access barriers (current limitations of the client), and assess the client’s motor, language, literacy, and other capabilities.
Displays
Systems or devices that show the message to their communication partner. Range from communication boards to computer screens.
Iconic Symbols
Looks like the object or picture they represent. E.g., a picture of a house to represent a house.
Noniconic Symbols
Arbitrary, abstract, and geometric pictures used in AAC. They do not resemble to objects they represent and must be specifically taught. E.g., flexible plastic shapes and chips.
Direct Selection
The AAC user selects a message by touching an item or objet, depressing an electronic key, pointing, or some other direct means.
Scanning
The AAC user is offered available messages by a mechanical device or communication partner. The messages are offered sequentially until the AAC user indicates the messages he or she wants to communicate.
Gestural (Unaided) AAC
A form of AAC where no instruments or external aids are used. Rather, the individual uses gestures and other patterned movements, which may be accompanied by some speech. Forms of this include pantomime, eye-blink encoding, American Indian Hand Talk, American Sign Language, limited manual sign systems, and Left-Hand Manual Alphabet.
Pantomime
Mostly uses gestures and dynamic movements that involve the entire body or parts of the body. The individual uses transparent messages, facial expressions, and dramatizations of meaning.
Transparent Messages
Messages that are likely to be understood with no additional cues by an observer without special training. Ease of deciphering what the symbol means.
Opaque Messages
Messages that are not easily decipherable.
Eye-Blink Encoding
A simple AAC system in which the individual learns to communicate a message by a specific number of blinks.
American Indian Hand Talk (AMER-IND)
A sign language system developed by North American Indians. Not phonetic; rather, gestures and movements are used as pictorial representations of concepts and ideas.
American Sign Language (ASL)
Consists of manual signs for the 26 letters of the alphabet as well as for words and phrases. Recognized as a separate language. May be used alone or with oral speech.
Limited Manual Sign Systems
Composed of several different systems with a limited number of gestures and signs. Often used by patients in medical settings to communicate self-care and other basic needs, and to say ‘yes’ and ‘no.’
Left-Hand Manual Alphabet
Composed of concrete gestures that approximate printed letters of the alphabet. Most appropriate for people with right-sided paresis.
Gestural-Assisted (Aided) AAC
A form of AAC where gestures or movements are combined with an instrument or message-display device. Gestures are used to display messages on a mechanical device (e.g., computer) or to scan or select messages based on a nonmechanical device (e.g., communication board).
Picysms
Graphic symbols that represent nouns, verbs, and prepositions.
Pic Symbols
White drawings on a black background. Also known as pictogram ideogram communication.
Blissymbols
Semi-iconic and abstract symbols that can be taught to speakers of any linguistic and cultural background.
Sig Symbols
Ideographic or pictographic symbols based on ASL. Often used in conjunction with ASL.
Rebuses
Pictures that represent events or objects along with words, grammatical morphemes, or both.
Premack-Type Symbols/Carrier Symbols
Abstract plastic shapes. Each shape is associated with a word or phrase, and individuals may arrange the plastic shapes as one would with printed words.
Picture Exchange Communication System (PECS)
A low-tech-aided method of communication that is known to be effective. The clinician initially teaches the client to exchange specific pictures to communicate with a partner (e.g., hands the picture of a glass of water to the partner to request water). Eventually promotes spontaneous verbal expressions.
Neuro-Assisted (Aided) AAC
A form of AAC useful for individuals with such profound motoric impairments and limited hand mobility that they cannot use a manual switching device. Uses bioelectrical signals such as muscle-action potentials to activate and display messages on a computer monitor. Electrodes are attached to the skin. User receives feedback when a switch is activated. Equipment is expensive and challenging to maintain.
Facilitated Communication
A technique of language treatment for individuals with severe impairments such as autism and CP. The facilitator uses physical contact with child’s hand, wrist, or elbow to facilitate pointing on a message board, writing, or typing. Not recommended, known to be ineffective.
