This project uses a narrative view of identity to interrogate how individuals construct notions of ability and disability within their families. Participants include children with disabilities from diverse ethnic backgrounds, their parents, siblings, and extended family members. Interactions within four families are explored as well as…

Play and language development were compared in four normally developing preschoolers and five language-delayed children (2.5-6 years old). Ss were administered a scale which assessed play, language, and drawing stages. Data were graphed and studied in terms of distribution and level of function across the three symbolic function areas (play,…

The article discusses several linguistic and nonlinguistic teaching strategies to foster language acquisition and increase spontaneous language in preschool children with language delays. Techniques include having the child complete unfinished sentences and intentionally violating an expected routine to elicit the child's language. (DB)

Articulatory generalization of velar cognates /k/, /g/ in two phonologically disordered young children was studied over time as a function of sequential word-morpheme position training. Results suggested that the view of the word-medial position as a unitary concept is an oversimplification. (Author/DB)

The study examined whether 10 developmentally delayed children (3:3 to 5:4 years old) would demonstrate superior comprehension for restricted, syntactically incomplete as compared to reduced, syntactically complete forms. The five children functioning at late linguistic stage I demonstrated better comprehension than the early stage I children for…

Topic continuing and nontopic continuing utterances produced by three productively language-disordered preschoolers were analyzed. Results suggested that Ss produced a proportion of adjacent utterances comparable to proportions previously reported for children with normal production language skills and that they relied on an imitation strategy to…

Listeners had more difficulty identifying vowels uttered by 4-year-olds classified as late language users than those uttered by 4-year-olds classified as normal. (MH)

The responses of 18 phonologically delayed children, aged 6-7, to 3 types of pictured stimuli were examined. Results indicated that black and white drawings were less frequently identified than either colored line drawings or colored photographs. (Author/JDD)

Production of grammatical morphemes was examined in free speech samples from 34 4-year-olds with history of slow expressive language development (SELD) and control group. Both the SELD children who had caught up in mean length of utterance by age four and those who had not had acquired fewer grammatical morphemes than controls, though acquisition…

The guide describes communication games--simple, noncompetitive structured activities designed to promote conversational and linguistic skills in children with language delays and language disabilities. The approach is distinguished from traditional approaches by the creation of a genuine need for talking rather than arbitrary demands, emphasis on…

The mother and teacher of a boy who lacked speech skills (eventually diagnosed as generalized apraxia, severe in the speech modality) describe the boy's various diagnoses and educational treatments and the successful use of sign language to improve his expressive communication. (LS)

To examine the effectiveness of a maternal intervention curriculum, 40 mothers and children with varying degrees of language delay were assigned to one of two intervention groups matched on child characteristics. Program impact was assessed through standardized tests (the Sequenced Inventory of Communicative Development to measure whether…

Summarizes the available data on the spontaneous signing of nonverbal mentally handicapped children and discusses possible reasons for the spontaneity. Instructional techniques for promoting spontaneity are outlined, and implications of sign spontaneity for research are considered. (Author/EJS)

This study attempted to test the notion that the reinforcing stimuli which maintain high rates of speech may not consist solely of events extrinsic to the person but may involve (sensory) stimulation generated by the behavior itself. (Author)