scholarly journals A Narrative Evaluation of Mandarin-Speaking Children With Language Impairment

2018 ◽  
Vol 61 (2) ◽  
pp. 345-359 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ying Hao ◽  
Li Sheng ◽  
Yiwen Zhang ◽  
Fan Jiang ◽  
Jill de Villiers ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Language Impairment ◽  
Syntactic Complexity ◽  
Typically Developing ◽  
Linguistic Features ◽  
Lexical Diversity ◽  
Fine Grained ◽  
Narrative Skills ◽  
European Languages ◽  
Ambient Language ◽  
Comparable Performance

Purpose We aimed to study narrative skills in Mandarin-speaking children with language impairment (LI) to compare with children with LI speaking Indo-European languages. Method Eighteen Mandarin-speaking children with LI (mean age 6;2 [years;months]) and 18 typically developing (TD) age controls told 3 stories elicited using the Mandarin Expressive Narrative Test (de Villiers & Liu, 2014). We compared macrostructure-evaluating descriptions of characters, settings, initiating events, internal responses,plans, actions, and consequences. We also studied general microstructure, including productivity, lexical diversity, syntactic complexity, and grammaticality. In addition, we compared the use of 6 fine-grained microstructure elements that evaluate particular Mandarin linguistic features. Results Children with LI exhibited weaknesses in 5 macrostructure elements, lexical diversity, syntactic complexity, and 3 Mandarin-specific, fine-grained microstructure elements. Children with LI and TD controls demonstrated comparable performance on 2 macrostructure elements, productivity, grammaticality, and the remaining 3 fine-grained microstructure features. Conclusions Similarities and differences are noted in narrative profiles of children with LI who speak Mandarin versus those who speak Indo-European languages. The results are consistent with the view that profiles of linguistic deficits are shaped by the ambient language. Clinical implications are discussed.

Assessment of Preschool Narrative Skills

1994 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 45-56 ◽  
Author(s):  
Allyssa McCabe ◽  
Pamela Rosenthal Rollins
Keyword(s):  
Young Children ◽  
Language Impairment ◽  
Early Identification ◽  
Narrative Development ◽  
Typically Developing ◽  
Children At Risk ◽  
Narrative Skills ◽  
English Speaking ◽  
Narrative Skill ◽  
Discourse Skills

The assessment of discourse skills in young children is an important responsibility facing clinicians today. Early identification of problems in discourse skills and, more specifically, narrative abilities is especially important for identifying children at risk for later learning and literacy-related difficulties. Despite this, few tools are available for assessing narrative skills in preschoolers. In this article we provide information concerning preschool narrative development in typically developing, North American, Caucasian, English-speaking children. Methods are suggested for assessing narrative skill of children with language impairment and children developing language normally. Transcripts of narratives from these children are presented, along with specific recommendations for evaluating these narratives.

The Rules of the Game: Properties of a Database of Expository Language Samples

2014 ◽  
Vol 45 (4) ◽  
pp. 277-290 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Heilmann ◽  
Thomas O. Malone
Keyword(s):  
Oral Language ◽  
Syntactic Complexity ◽  
Typically Developing ◽  
Lexical Diversity ◽  
Benchmark Data ◽  
Multiple Dimensions ◽  
Expository Discourse ◽  
Language Measures ◽  
Further Development ◽  
Rules Of The Game

Purpose The authors created a database of expository oral language samples with the aims of describing the nature of students' expository discourse and providing benchmark data for typically developing preteen and teenage students. Method Using a favorite game or sport protocol, language samples were collected from 235 typically developing students in Grades 5, 6, 7, and 9. Twelve language measures were summarized from this database and analyses were completed to test for differences across ages and topics. To determine whether distinct dimensions of oral language could be captured with language measures from these expository samples, a factor analysis was completed. Results Modest differences were observed in language measures across ages and topics. The language measures were effectively classified into four distinct dimensions: syntactic complexity, expository content, discourse difficulties, and lexical diversity. Conclusion Analysis of expository data provides a functional and curriculum-based assessment that has the potential to allow clinicians to document multiple dimensions of children's expressive language skills. Further development and testing of the database will establish the feasibility of using it to compare individual students' expository discourse skills to those of their typically developing peers.

Lexical Diversity in the Spontaneous Speech of Children With Specific Language Impairment

2002 ◽  
Vol 45 (5) ◽  
pp. 927-937 ◽  
Author(s):  
Amanda J. Owen ◽  
Laurence B. Leonard
Keyword(s):  
Sample Size ◽  
Language Impairment ◽  
Specific Language Impairment ◽  
Spontaneous Speech ◽  
Developmental Differences ◽  
Typically Developing ◽  
Typically Developing Children ◽  
Lexical Diversity ◽  
Specific Language ◽  
Mean Length Of Utterance

The lexical diversity of children with specific language impairment (SLI) (ages 3 years 7 months to 7 years 3 months) was compared to that of normally developing same-age peers and younger normally developing children matched according to mean length of utterance in words (MLUw). Lexical diversity was calculated from spontaneous speech samples using D, a measure that uses repeated calculations of type-token ratio (TTR) to estimate how TTR changes as the speech samples increase in size. When D computations were based on 250-word samples, developmental differences were apparent. For both children with SLI and typically developing children, older subgroups showed higher D scores than younger subgroups, and subgroups with higher MLUws showed higher D scores than subgroups with lower MLUws. Children with SLI did not differ from same-age peers. At lower MLUw levels, children with SLI showed higher D scores than younger typically developing children matched for MLUw. The developmental sensitivity of D notwithstanding, comparisons using 100-utterance samples, in which the number of lexical tokens varied as a function of the children's MLUws, and comparisons between 250- and 500-word samples revealed the possible influence of sample size on this measure. However, analysis of the effect sizes using smaller and larger samples revealed that D is not affected by sample size to the degree seen for more traditional measures of lexical diversity.

Toddlers' Verb Lexicon Diversity and Grammatical Outcomes

2016 ◽  
Vol 47 (1) ◽  
pp. 44-58 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pamela A. Hadley ◽  
Matthew Rispoli ◽  
Ning Hsu
Keyword(s):  
Language Impairment ◽  
Linear Growth ◽  
Clinical Decision Making ◽  
Clinical Decision ◽  
Parent Report ◽  
Typically Developing ◽  
Lexical Diversity ◽  
Communicative Development ◽  
Archival Database ◽  
Verb Lexicon

Purpose The goals of this study were to quantify longitudinal expectations for verb lexicon growth and to determine whether verb lexicon measures were better predictors of later grammatical outcomes than noun lexicon measures. Method Longitudinal parent-report measures from the MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventory (Fenson et al., 2007) from ages 21 to 30 months from an archival database were used to model growth in common noun and verb lexicon size for 45 typically developing toddlers. Communicative Development Inventory growth coefficients and 24-month measures of lexical diversity from spontaneous language samples were used to predict 30-month grammatical outcomes on the Index of Productive Syntax (Scarborough, 1990). Results Average verb growth was characterized by 50.57 verbs at 24 months, with linear growth of 8.29 verbs per month and deceleration overall. Children with small verb lexicons or slow linear growth at 24 months accelerated during this developmental period. Verb lexicon measures were better predictors of grammatical outcomes than noun lexicon measures, accounting for 47.8% of the variance in Index of Productive Syntax scores. Lexical verb diversity in spontaneous speech emerged as the single best predictor. Conclusion Measures of verb lexicon size and diversity should be included as part of early language assessment to guide clinical decision making with young children at risk for language impairment.

Eliciting Verbs From Children With Specific Language Impairment

1996 ◽  
Vol 5 (4) ◽  
pp. 17-30 ◽  
Author(s):  
Diane Frome Loeb ◽  
Clifton Pye ◽  
Sean Redmond ◽  
Lori Zobel Richardson
Keyword(s):  
Young Children ◽  
Language Impairment ◽  
Specific Language Impairment ◽  
Syntactic Complexity ◽  
Specific Language ◽  
Lexical Skills

The focus of assessment and intervention is often aimed at increasing the lexical skills of young children with language impairment. Frequently, the use of nouns is the center of the lexical assessment. As a result, the production of verbs is not fully evaluated or integrated into treatment in a way that accounts for their semantic and syntactic complexity. This paper presents a probe for eliciting verbs from children, describes its effectiveness, and discusses the utility of and problems associated with developing such a probe.

Children's Nonword Repetition Tasks and English Language Learners

2010 ◽  
Vol 11 (3) ◽  
pp. 73-79
Author(s):  
Sara C. Steele ◽  
Deborah A. Hwa-Froelich
Keyword(s):  
English Language Learners ◽  
Language Learners ◽  
Language Impairment ◽  
English Language ◽  
Nonword Repetition ◽  
Adopted Children ◽  
Typically Developing ◽  
Bilingual Speakers ◽  
Internationally Adopted Children ◽  
English Speaking

Nonword repetition performance has been shown to differentiate monolingual English-speaking children with language impairment (LI) from typically developing children. These tasks have been administered to monolingual speakers of different languages and to simultaneous and sequential bilingual English Language Learners (ELLs) with mixed results. This article includes a review of the nonword repetition performance of monolingual and bilingual speakers and of internationally adopted children. Clinical implications for administration and interpretation of nonword repetition task outcomes are included.

ASSILIMATED WORDS FROM RUSSIAN AND EUROPEAN LANGUAGES THROUGH IT// Academy Journal No.6(18), 2019/ Chief Editors Susan Belih & Jaak Järv /OEAPS Inc.(Open European Academy of Public Sciences) & Estonian Academy of Sciences. Tallinn, Estonia. 09.06.2019: OEAPS Inc., 2019. - PP. 12-14 (ISBN:9781073495887, ISSN 1736-7530 (electronic)

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shakhzodbek Baxtiyarovich Matnazarov
Keyword(s):  
Living Conditions ◽  
Cultivated Plants ◽  
Linguistic Features ◽  
European Academy ◽  
European Languages ◽  
Academy Of Sciences

This article reviews the linguistic features of some cultivated plants in the Khorezm language and has been thoroughly analyzed. Traditions, traditions, living conditions of Turkic and Mongolian peoples, as well as their similarity in agriculture, have also been reflected in their languages. This is particularly evident in many meetings of Turkish and Mongolian parallels in the field of agriculture and livestock.

English Past Tense Use in Bilingual Children With Language Impairment

2005 ◽  
Vol 14 (4) ◽  
pp. 313-323 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peggy F. Jacobson ◽  
Richard G. Schwartz
Keyword(s):  
Language Impairment ◽  
Bilingual Children ◽  
Past Tense ◽  
Typically Developing ◽  
Language Differences ◽  
Error Patterns ◽  
History Of ◽  
English Speaking ◽  
Irregular Verbs ◽  
Verb Categories

Grammatical measures that distinguish language differences from language disorders in bilingual children are scarce. This study examined English past tense morphology in sequential bilingual Spanish/English-speaking children, age 7;0–9;0 (years;months). Twelve bilingual children with language impairment (LI) or history of LI and 15 typically developing (TD) bilingual children participated. Thirty-six instances of the past tense including regular, irregular, and novel verbs were examined using an elicited production task. By examining English past tense morphology in sequential bilinguals, we uncovered similarities and differences in the error patterns of TD children and children with LI. The groups differed in the overall accuracy of past tense use according to verb type, as well as the characteristic error patterns. Children with LI performed lower than their TD peers on all verb categories, with an interaction between verb type and group. TD children were better at producing regular verbs and exhibited more productive errors (e.g., overregularization). Conversely, children with LI performed relatively better on irregular verbs and poorest on novel verbs, and they exhibited more nonproductive errors (e.g., bare stem verbs). The results have important clinical implications for the assessment of morphological productivity in Spanish-speaking children who are learning English sequentially.

Isoglosses and language change: Evidence of the rise and loss of isoglosses from a comparison of early Greek and early English

2020 ◽  
Vol 56 (4) ◽  
pp. 553-575
Author(s):  
Nikolaos Lavidas
Keyword(s):  
Language Change ◽  
The Other ◽  
Linguistic Features ◽  
Considerable Distance ◽  
Causative Constructions ◽  
European Languages ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
Structural Ambiguity ◽  
Early English ◽  
Aspectual Verbs

Abstract We analyze the rise and loss of isoglosses in two Indo-European languages, early Greek and early English, which, however, show considerable distance between their structures in many other domains. We follow Keidan’s approach (2013), that has drawn the attention on the fact that the study of isoglosses (i.e., linguistic features common to two or more languages) is connected with common innovations of particular languages after the split into sub-groups of Indo-European: this type of approach aims at collecting isoglosses that appear across the branches of Indo-European. We examine the rise of the isogloss of labile verbs and the loss of the isogloss of the two classes of aspectual verbs in early Greek and early English. Our study shows that the rise of labile verbs in both languages is related to the innovative use of intransitives in causative constructions. On the other hand, the innovations in voice morphology follow different directions in Greek and English and are unrelated to the rise of labile verbs. In contrast to labile verbs, which are still predominant for causative-anticausative constructions in both languages, the two classes of aspectual verbs are lost in the later stages of Greek but are predominant even in Present-day English. Again, a “prerequisite” change for the isogloss can be easily located in a structural ambiguity that is relevant for aspectual verbs in early Greek and early English. However, another independent development, the changes in verbal complementation (the development of infinitival and participial complements) in Greek and English, determined the loss of this isogloss.

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