The Development of English as a Second Language With and Without Specific Language Impairment: Clinical Implications

Culturally and linguistically diverse children's retention of spoken narratives encoded in quiet and in babble noise

Multi-talker noise impedes children's speech processing and may affect children listening to their second language more than children listening to their first language. Evidence suggests that multi-talker noise also may impede children's memory retention and learning. A total of 80 culturally and linguistically diverse children aged 7 to 9 years listened to narratives in two listening conditions: quiet and multi-talker noise (signal-to-noise ratio +6 dB). Repeated recall (immediate and delayed recall), was measured with a 1-week retention interval. Retention was calculated as the difference in recall accuracy per question between immediate and delayed recall. Working memory capacity was assessed, and the children's degree of school language (Swedish) exposure was quantified. Immediate narrative recall was lower for the narrative encoded in noise than in quiet. During delayed recall, narrative recall was similar for both listening conditions. Children with higher degrees of school language exposure and higher working memory capacity had better narrative recall overall, but these factors were not associated with an effect of listening condition or retention. Multi-talker babble noise does not impair culturally and linguistically diverse primary school children's retention of spoken narratives as measured by multiple-choice questions. Although a quiet listening condition allows for a superior encoding compared with a noisy listening condition, details are likely lost during memory consolidation and re-consolidation.

Speech-Language Outcomes in the COVID-19 Milieu for Multilingual Jamaican Preschoolers and Considerations for Telepractice Assessments

PURPOSE

The purpose of this study was to characterize the communicative participation and functional speech intelligibility (i.e., how children use communication and how well they are understood across everyday life) of typically developing (TD) bilingual Jamaican preschoolers and those with functionally defined speech sound disorders (fSSDs) in the COVID-19 milieu. Findings were also compared to an existing corpus of baseline data to document and explore differences in children's speech-language outcomes secondary to pandemic-related social restrictions.

METHOD

Thirty bilingual Jamaican preschoolers, 21 TD and nine with fSSDs, were assessed during the pandemic via telepractice. Association and univariate mean testing were completed to characterize children's communicative participation and functional speech intelligibility. Data were then compared to an existing corpus of baseline data (collected in person between 2013 and 2019), which included direct child assessment and parent reports and consisted of TD (n = 226) Jamaican Creole-English-speaking preschoolers and those with fSSDs (n = 39) to compare performance profiles across data sets. All participants attended schools in Kingston, Jamaica.

RESULTS

Measures of communicative participation remained stable in the context of the COVID-19 milieu for children in the TD and fSSD groups, but functional speech intelligibility outcomes for children with fSSDs deviated between in-person findings collected from children pre-pandemic. Between-groups differences were also found on measures of speech production accuracy but were no longer significant when considering telepractice as a covariate.

CONCLUSIONS

Findings from this investigation serve to characterize the communicative participation and functional speech intelligibility of TD bilingual Jamaican preschoolers and those with fSSDs in the COVID-19 milieu. By extension, the results comparing data from preschoolers collected during the pandemic to an existing corpus of baseline data from a different group of preschoolers provide critical insights about multilingual children's speech-language outcomes in the context of acutely changing environmental circumstances.

SUPPLEMENTAL MATERIAL

https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.25461505.

Monolingual and bilingual children's production of complex syntactic structures

Typically-developing bilingual children often score lower than monolingual peers of the same age on standardized measures; however, research has shown that when assessed in more natural discourse contexts, bilinguals can perform similar to age-matched monolinguals in some language subdomains. This study investigated complex syntax production in simultaneous French-English bilingual children and monolingual age-matched peers, using structured and spontaneous measures. Surprisingly, the bilinguals scored higher than the monolinguals on the structured task. There was no difference between groups on the spontaneous measure; however, predictors of complex syntax production differed by language groups and by tasks. Contrary to other language subdomains showing bilingual English development as protracted relative to monolingual peers, these results point to a relative strength of complex syntax acquisition among simultaneous bilingual children. Differences in exposure relative to monolingual children may be less pronounced in syntax, in part because bilinguals can benefit from syntactic knowledge in their other language.

Spanish Bilingual Morphosyntactic Development in Bilingual Children With and Without Developmental Language Disorder: Articles, Clitics, Verbs, and the Subjunctive Mood

PURPOSE

The purpose of this study was to examine the growth of previously established clinical markers of developmental language disorder (DLD) in Spanish-speaking bilingual children with and without DLD.

METHOD

Forty-three bilingual children with DLD and 57 typically developing children were tested 3 times over a 2-year period. Their average age at Time 1 was 5;10 (years;months). All children completed an elicitation task examining the production of articles, clitics, verbs, and the subjunctive mood in Spanish at each time point, in addition to other behavioral testing in Spanish and English. We used growth curve analysis to examine change patterns of the morphosyntactic structures over time.

RESULTS

At the onset of the study, children without DLD produced higher accuracy rates than children with DLD across all morphosyntactic structures. In addition, there was a positive effect of time on all structures. Furthermore, the interaction between time and DLD was statistically significant for clitic pronouns.

CONCLUSION

In agreement with previous literature on language growth in monolingual children with DLD, bilingual children with DLD showed language growth that was parallel to that of bilingual children without DLD but with significantly lower levels of attainment.

SUPPLEMENTAL MATERIAL AND PRESENTATION VIDEO

https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.23810820.

Supporting Culturally Responsive Assessment Practices With Preschoolers: Guidance From Methods in the Jamaican Context

PURPOSE

There is a shortage of available methods to accurately inform the developmental status of children whose cultural and linguistic backgrounds vary from the mainstream. The purpose of this review article was to describe different approaches used to support the accurate characterization of speech, language, and functional communication in children speaking Jamaican Creole and English, an understudied paradigm in the speech pathology research.

METHOD

Approaches used across four previously published studies in the Jamaican Creole Language Project are described. Participants included 3- to 6-year-old Jamaican children (n = 98-262) and adults (n = 15-33). Studies I and II described validation efforts about children's functional communication using the Intelligibility in Context Scale (ICS; speech) and the Focus on the Outcomes of Communication Under Six (FOCUS; speech and language). Study III described efforts to accurately characterize difference and disorder in children's expressive grammar using adapted scoring, along with adult models to contextualize child responses. Last, Study IV applied acoustic duration (e.g., whole word) and an adapted scoring protocol to inform variation in speech sound productions in the Jamaican context where a post-Creole continuum exists.

RESULTS

Studies I and II offered promising psychometric evidence about the utility of the ICS and the FOCUS. Study III revealed strong sensitivity and specificity in classifying difference and disorder using adult models. Last, in Study IV, linguistically informed acoustic analyses and an adapted protocol captured variation in speech productions better than a standard approach.

CONCLUSIONS

Applying culturally responsive methods can enhance the accurate characterization of speech, language, and functional communication in Jamaican children. The innovative methods used offer a model approach that could be applied to other linguistic contexts where a mismatch exists between speech-language pathologists and their clientele.

PRESENTATION VIDEO

https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.23929461.

Bilingual children acquiring Russian and German in Vienna: nonword repetition correlates with stronger but not with weaker language

PURPOSE

Nonword repetition tests (NWRT) can be useful tools together with other assessment procedures for diagnosing a developmental learning disorder in bilingual children. Concerning typically developing children, however, the link between NWRT performance and language development is still unclear. The present study contributes to this discussion by investigating the link between language-dependent NWRT performance, language development, and language exposure.

METHODS

A total of 20 simultaneously bilingual Russian-German children, aged 4-6 years, were tested with "The Russian language proficiency test for multilingual children (SRUK)" and "Patholinguistische Diagnostik bei Sprachentwicklungsstörungen (PDSS)" as well as language-specific nonwords for Russian and German.

RESULTS

Most children scored within the mean range in SRUK. In PDSS they scored two standard deviations below the mean range in most of the subtests. NWRT in Russian significantly correlated with the NWRT in German and also positively correlated with both comprehension and production in Russian. In contrast, the German NWRT did not correlate with comprehension or with production in German. Moreover, the correlation between the German NWRT and the comprehension of grammatical structures in Russian was significant, and the correlations between the German NWRT and the two other Russian language development tests just failed to reach significance.

CONCLUSION

High scores in both the Russian and the German NWRT offer evidence that the ability to repeat language-specific nonwords does not differ depending on language exposure. The aim to distinguish between typical and atypical language development based on NWRT can be reached only when NWRT and all possible influencing factors in typically developed children are analyzed.

Longitudinal Examination of Morphosyntactic Skills in Bilingual Children: Spanish and English Standardized Scores

PURPOSE

This study aimed to examine changes in English and Spanish morphosyntactic standardized scores over time in bilingual children.

METHOD

One hundred bilingual children participated in this longitudinal study. The average age of the children at the beginning of the study was 5;11 (years;months). A subset of the participants was identified as children with developmental language disorder (DLD, n = 43). Children completed behavioral testing in Spanish and English at three time points over a period of 2 years. Growth curve modeling was employed to analyze longitudinal data.

RESULTS

Distinct patterns of Spanish and English language growth were observed. While the average standard score in English increased, the average score in Spanish decreased over time for both groups. Children with DLD showed persistent language difficulties in both Spanish and English over time in comparison to their peers.

CONCLUSIONS

The results of this study provide evidence of a shift in language proficiency from Spanish to English for bilingual children with and without language disorders. This study also shows that bilingual children with DLD show a protracted but parallel growth in morphosyntactic skills in comparison to children without DLD.

SUPPLEMENTAL MATERIAL

https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.23671464.

Construct validity of the focus on the outcomes of communication under six (FOCUS) total and profile scores for multilingual preschoolers: Considering functional speech skills

PURPOSE

To conduct an exploratory study to establish construct validity of the Focus on the Outcomes of Communication Under Six (FOCUS) in the Jamaican context for FOCUS Total and Profile scores.

METHOD

Parents of a representative sample of 3-to-6-year-old Jamaican Creole (JC)-English-speaking simultaneous bilingual children completed the FOCUS in English, and the Intelligibility in Context Scale (ICS) in JC and in English. Children completed the Diagnostic Evaluation of Articulation and Phonology (DEAP) in both languages. Percent phonemes, consonants, and vowels correct were calculated using single word responses to DEAP items. Pearson correlations were completed to describe relationships between measurement scores.

RESULT

Convergent validity was found for FOCUS Total and ICS/JC scores. Convergent and divergent validity were found for specific FOCUS Profile scores and ICS/JC scores. Minimal evidence of convergent validity was found with FOCUS Total scores and transcription-based measures of speech production in JC and in English. Convergent and divergent validity were found between specific FOCUS Profile scores and some transcription-based measures of speech production in JC and in English.

CONCLUSION

This study provides evidence of construct validity for FOCUS Total and Profile scores. It also provides validity evidence for FOCUS scores in a multilingual context using a representative sample of children that serves to broaden the range of applicability of the FOCUS.

Characterizing Communicative Participation in Multilingual Jamaican Preschoolers

PURPOSE

This study characterized communicative participation and related aspects of functional communication for Jamaican Creole (JC)-English-speaking preschoolers with and without functionally defined speech sound disorders (fSSDs). This study included parent reports and direct assessment measures from an existing corpus of baseline data collected prior to the COVID-19 pandemic.

METHOD

The communicative participation of typically developing (TD; n = 226) bilingual JC-English-speaking preschoolers and those with fSSDs (n = 39) was documented using the Focus on the Outcomes of Communication Under Six (FOCUS). Functional speech intelligibility was recorded using the Intelligibility in Context Scale (ICS) in English and JC (ICS-JC). Objective measures of speech production were collected through direct child assessment in both languages and then transcribed and calculated for percent of consonants (PCC), vowels (PVC), and phonemes correct (PPC). Within-group relationships were explored using association testing, and differences between groups were explored through multivariate analyses.

RESULTS

FOCUS scores and ICS and ICS-JC scores were found to be minimally to moderately related for Jamaican preschoolers in the TD group (r = .28-.34, p < .002) and strongly related in the fSSD group (r = .56-.60, p < .002). No relations were observed between the FOCUS scores and PCC/PVC/PPC in either language. There was a statistically significant difference between all FOCUS scores for Jamaican preschoolers in the TD and fSSD groups (p ≤ .002).

CONCLUSIONS

These findings provide additional evidence for using the FOCUS beyond documenting change in communicative participation to support clinical decision-making in planning and developing speech-language interventions. This study also documents an important characterization of JC-English-speaking children with and without fSSDs, offering data on children's abilities that can be used in future comparisons of communicative participation and speech functioning observed during the COVID-19 pandemic and beyond.

Sentence Diversity in Spanish-English Bilingual Toddlers

PURPOSE

There remain few available tools to assess language development in Spanish-English dual language learner (DLL) toddlers in the United States. Of interest is the development of early sentences as children move from producing single words to producing multiword utterances. This study is the first to extend sentence diversity to the context of Spanish-English DLLs by describing development from 24 to 30 months of age in children with and without language delays (LDs).

METHOD

Spontaneous language samples were collected from Spanish-dominant DLL children and their mothers as they were observed during a free-play interaction. Existing sentence diversity protocols were adapted for the DLL context to describe children's flexibility in combining subjects and verbs to form utterances in Spanish and English.

RESULTS

Children maintained an accurate separation in their grammars for subject-verb combinations in Spanish versus English. There was an overwhelming preference for Spanish subject-verb combinations with null subjects. The emergence of sentence diversity distinguished children with and without early LD unlike the emergence of word combinations.

CONCLUSIONS

Consistent with prior research, findings showed that DLLs did not confuse grammatical structures across languages. Instead, they showed a differential pattern of results in each language, such that the strongest grammatical skills were evinced first in the dominant language. Sentence diversity shows promise for assessment and progress monitoring in Spanish-English DLLs in the United States.

Focus on the Outcomes of Communication Under Six: Validation of Language Skills in the Jamaican Context

The Focus on the Outcomes of Communication Under Six (FOCUS) is one of a few validated outcome measures related to children's communicative participation. Additional validation of the FOCUS measure could address the paucity of validated outcomes-based measures available for assessing preschool-age children, particularly for those who are multilingual. The data collected for this study, with a representative sample of Jamaican Creole-English speaking children, extend the applicability of the FOCUS to a broader range of preschoolers and expand psychometric evidence for the FOCUS to a multilingual and understudied context.

Language Disorders Research on Bilingualism, School-Age, and Related Difficulties: A Scoping Review of Descriptive Studies

BACKGROUND

Developmental language disorder (DLD) often remains undetected until children shift from 'learning to read' to 'reading to learn,' around 9 years of age. Mono- and bilingual children with DLD frequently have co-occurring reading, attention, and related difficulties, compared to children with typical language development (TLD). Data for mono- and bilingual children with DLD and TLD would aid differentiation of language differences versus disorders in bilingual children.

OBJECTIVE

We conducted a scoping review of descriptive research on mono-and bilingual children < and >= 9 years old with DLD versus TLD, and related skills (auditory processing, attention, cognition, executive function, and reading).

DATA SOURCES

We searched PubMed for the terms "bilingual" and "language disorders" or "impairment" and "child[ren]" from August 1, 1979 through October 1, 2018.

CHARTING METHODS

Two abstracters charted all search results. Main exclusions were: secondary data/reviews, special populations, intervention studies, and case studies/series. Abstracted data included age, related skills measures', and four language groups of participants: monolingual DLD, monolingual TLD, bilingual DLD, and bilingual TLD.

RESULTS

Of 366 articles, 159 (43%) met inclusion criteria. Relatively few (14%, n = 22) included all 4 language groups, co-occurring difficulties other than nonverbal intelligence (n = 49, 31%) or reading (n = 51, 32%) or any 9-18 year-olds (31%, n = 48). Just 5 (3%) included only 9-18 year-olds. Among studies with any 9 to 18 year olds, just 4 (8%, 4/48) included 4 language groups.

CONCLUSIONS

Future research should include mono- and bilingual children with both DLD and TLD, beyond 8 years of age, along with data about their related skills.

The Bilingual Native Speaker Competence: Evidence From Explicit and Implicit Language Knowledge Using Elicited Production, Sentence-Picture Matching, and Pupillometry

The present pilot study investigated potential effects of early and late child bilingualism in highly proficient adult bilinguals. It has been shown that some early second language (eL2) speakers stagnate when it comes to complex linguistic phenomena and that they display subtle difficulties in adulthood. Therefore, we have chosen the complex structure of double object constructions. We investigate the long-term achievement in a combined-method approach using elicited production, explicit comprehension by sentence-picture matching and a measure of implicit linguistic knowledge, namely pupillometry. This eye tracking method is suitable for measuring implicit reactions of the pupils to unexpected or ungrammatical stimuli. For production, ditransitive structures were elicited by means of a game. For comprehension, a sentence-picture matching task was conducted. Two pictures were shown on a monitor that were equal with respect to the involved objects, but the thematic roles of direct and indirect objects were interchanged. Items were controlled for length, gender, animacy, semantic likelihood and word order. Reaction times and accuracy scores were analyzed. To this end, N = 18 bilingual adult speakers of German (+ another language, mean age: 26.5) with different ages of onset participated in this study and were compared to N = 26 monolingual German adult speakers (mean age 23.9). All participants had a proficiency of German above 89% correct in placement and cloze tests. Results show fully comparable productive and comprehensive competencies in monolinguals and bilinguals including the reaction times in the sentence-picture matching task and a word order effect on the reaction times in both groups. In the pupillometry task, we found monolinguals and bilinguals to be sensitive to differing conditions with respect to grammatical and ungrammatical utterances. However, we find between group differences in pupil dilations in that bilinguals react differently to strong grammatical violations than monolinguals. These results are discussed with respect to the term of native speaker competence and the variation within both groups.

The Cultural and Diagnostic Appropriateness of Standardized Assessments for Dual Language Learners: A Focus on Jamaican Preschoolers

Purpose The aim of this study was to investigate the appropriateness of standardized assessments of expressive grammar and vocabulary in a sample of preschool-age dual language learners (DLLs) who use Jamaican Creole (JC) and English. Adult models from the same linguistic community as these children were used to inform culturally and linguistically appropriate interpretation of children's responses to a standardized assessment. Method JC-English-speaking preschoolers (n = 176) and adults (n = 33) completed the Word Structure and Expressive Vocabulary subtests of the Clinical Evaluation of Language Fundamentals Preschool-Second Edition. Adults' responses were used to develop an adapted scoring procedure that considered the influence of JC linguistic features on responses. DLLs' responses scored using the standard English and adapted JC procedures were compared. Results JC-English DLLs and adults used similar linguistic structures in response to subtest questions. DLLs' scores differed significantly from the standardized sample on both subtests. Preschoolers received higher raw and corresponding standard scores with adapted scoring compared to standard scoring. Adapted scoring that made use of adult models yielded high classification accuracy at a rate of 93.8% for Word Structure and 92.1% for Expressive Vocabulary. Conclusions Adapting standardized assessment scoring procedures using adult models may offer an ecologically valid approach to working with DLL preschoolers that can support a more accurate assessment of language functioning. These findings suggest that the use of standardized assessments for bilingual JC-English speakers requires a culturally responsive approach. Supplemental Material https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.14403026.

Current practices of New Zealand speech-language pathologists working with multilingual children

Purpose: This study aimed to identify the current practices of New Zealand speech-language pathologists (SLPs) working with multilingual children, to compare these with best practice guidelines and make recommendations for training and service development.Method: An online survey was sent to SLPs working with children in New Zealand, asking questions about their training, languages spoken and management of multilingual children.Result: Responses from 146 SLPs were analysed. While 28% reported over 25% of children on their caseloads were multilingual, most SLPs felt under-trained to work with these clients. In accordance with best practice guidelines, SLPs supported retention of home languages for their multilingual children. Half of the children seen were assessed and treated in all languages, despite the majority of SLPs being monolingual English speakers. However contrary to best practice recommendations, parents were used as interpreters more frequently than professional interpreters. The SLPs reported a lack of resources for assessment and treatment of multilingual children. Informal assessments were frequently used, but dynamic assessment and peer-child comparisons were under-utilised.Conclusion: There were marked differences between SLPs' current practice with multilingual children and best practice guidelines. Increased training opportunities along with resource development in languages commonly spoken in New Zealand are required.

Which Measures Better Discriminate Language Minority Bilingual Children With and Without Developmental Language Disorder? A Study Testing a Combined Protocol of First and Second Language Assessment

Purpose This study aimed to assess a protocol for the evaluation of developmental language disorder (DLD) in language minority bilingual children (LMBC). The specific aims were (a) to test group differences, (b) to evaluate the discriminant validity of single measures included in the protocol, and (c) to define which model of combined variables had the best results in terms of efficacy and efficiency. Method Two groups of LMBC were involved, one with typical development (n = 35) selected from mainstream schools and one with DLD (n = 20). The study protocol included the collection of demographic information and linguistic history; a battery of standardized tests in their second language (Italian), including nonword repetition, morphosyntactic comprehension and production, and vocabulary and narrative skills; and direct (children's evaluation) and indirect (parents' questionnaire) assessment of linguistic skills in their first language. Results Results showed that the two groups differed in almost all linguistic measures. None of the single measures reached good specificity/sensitivity scores. A combined model that included direct and indirect assessment of first language skills, morphosyntactic comprehension and production, and nonword repetition reached good discriminant validity, with 94.5% of cases correctly classified. Discussion The study defines a complex picture of the linguistic profile in bilingual children with DLD, compared to typically developing bilingual peers. The results reinforce the idea that no single measure can be considered optimal in distinguishing children with DLD from typical peers. The study offers a concrete example of an effective and efficient protocol with which to discriminate LMBC with and without DLD.

The Utility of an English Semantics Measure for Identifying Developmental Language Disorder in Spanish-English Bilinguals

Purpose We examined the English semantic performance of three hundred twenty-seven 7- to 10-year-old Spanish-English bilinguals with (n = 66) and without (n = 261) developmental language disorder (DLD) with varying levels of English experience to classify groups. Method English semantic performance on the Bilingual English-Spanish Assessment-Middle Extension Experimental Test Version (Peña et al., 2008) was evaluated by language experience, language ability, and task type. Items that best identified DLD for children with balanced and high English experience were selected. Separately, items that best identified children with high Spanish experience were selected. Results Typically developing bilingual children performed significantly higher than their peers with DLD across semantic tasks, with differences associated with task type. Classification accuracy was fair when item selection corresponded to balanced or high level of experience in English, but poor for children with high Spanish experience. Selecting items specifically for children with high Spanish experience improved classification accuracy. Conclusions Tailoring semantic items based on children's experience is a promising direction toward organizing items on a continuum of exposure. Here, classification effectively ruled in impairment. Future work to refine semantic items that more accurately represent the continuum of exposure may help rule out language impairment.

Einbezug von Alter und Sprachkontaktdauer in die Wortschatzdiagnostik bei Mehrsprachigkeit

Zusammenfassung. Für die expressive Wortschatzdiagnostik mehrsprachiger Kinder im Grundschulalter fehlen Auswertungsansätze, die die heterogenen Bedingungen des Mehrspracherwerbs berücksichtigen. Solche Auswertungsansätze werden im Bildungs- und Gesundheitswesen gebraucht, um eine bessere Orientierung zu erhalten, welche mehrsprachigen Kinder sprachlich besonders auffällig sind. Die vorliegende Studie prüft, ob das Alter der Kinder und deren Kontaktdauer zur Umgebungssprache als Bestandteile mehrspracherwerbssensibler Normen für Wortschatzleistungen in der Umgebungssprache in Betracht kommen. Bei einer Stichprobe von 451 mehrsprachigen Grundschulkindern hatten das Alter und die Kontaktdauer einen bedeutsamen Einfluss auf den Wortschatz in der Umgebungssprache. Darüber hinaus zeigten sich differentielle Zusammenhänge. Kinder mit kürzerer Kontaktdauer unterschieden sich im Wortschatz stärker von Kindern, die z. B. ein Jahr älter und ein Kontaktjahr weiter fortgeschritten waren, als Kindern mit längerer Kontaktdauer. Insgesamt weisen die Ergebnisse darauf hin, dass die Entwicklung von mehrspracherwerbssensiblen Normen die Identifikation von sprachlich besonders auffälligen Kindern verbessern könnte.

Current Methods of Evaluating the Language Abilities of Multilingual Preschoolers: A Scoping Review Using the International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health-Children and Youth Version

Purpose The purpose of this scoping review was to identify current measures used to evaluate the language abilities of multilingual preschoolers within the framework of the International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health-Children and Youth Version (ICF-CY; World Health Organization, 2007 ). Method This review adhered to established models for conducting a comprehensive, iterative scoping review outlined by Arksey and O'Malley (2005) and Levac, Colquhoun, and O'Brien (2010) and included the following phases: (a) articulating the research question; (b) identifying relevant studies; (c) selecting studies; (d) charting the data; and (e) collating, summarizing, and reporting the results. The ICF-CY was used to frame the identified measures ( World Health Organization, 2007 ). Results Three hundred twenty-five peer-reviewed publications were identified and included in this review. The majority of publications used measures that evaluated the activity component of multilingual preschoolers' language (70%), with few evaluating participation (9%). Most identified measures (73%) assessed children's semantic language skills. We also observed that 88% of studies explicitly measured children's language input to interpret assessment results. Conclusions A variety of measures are currently used that address the activity component of the ICF-CY with a particular emphasis on semantics. There is, however, a dearth of measures examining language abilities for participation. The authors strongly recommend an increased focus on the development, use, and evaluation of measures that explicitly assess multilingual preschoolers' language participation, particularly in school-based settings. Supplemental Material https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.8637206.

Speaking and Reading in Two Languages: On the Identification of Reading and Language Disabilities in Spanish-Speaking English Learners

Articles in this issue examine (1) the primary sources of variability in reading and language achievement among Spanish-speaking English learners (ELs) in the United States, (2) the extent to which poor performance at the end of grade 2 is identifiable in developmental trajectories beginning in kindergarten, (3) the relations among core reading constructs of phonological awareness and decoding in both English and Spanish and the factors that affect their relationship, (4) the performance of different approaches to identification and the factors that influence how well they work, as well as (5) the growing literature focused on intervention for reading problems in this population. This article examines the literature on language minority students and disability identification and analyzes a large-scale longitudinal dataset (>4,000 ELs; >15,000 observations) to systematically characterize and describe the oral language and reading development of Spanish-speaking children designated as ELs from kindergarten to second grade, considering a range of factors that may potentially contribute to that characterization and its relation to academic performance. This systematic characterization should facilitate the development of an empirical basis for a theoretically grounded framework of typical development in ELs in order to more precisely identify those children with language and learning disabilities.

The Impact of the Spanish-to-English Proficiency Shift on the Grammaticality of English Learners

Purpose The general aim of this study is to enhance our understanding of the patterns of language growth in Spanish and English during the school years. In this study, we used a longitudinal retrospective approach to explore the growth of the percentage of grammatical utterances (PGU) in both Spanish and English in 2 groups of English learners (ELs): ELs attending English-only instruction and ELs attending Spanish-English bilingual instruction. Method The participants included 1,080 ELs. ELs produced at least 3 story retells in both Spanish and English between kindergarten and 2nd grade. All stories were transcribed and coded for errors, and PGU was calculated for each story. Results At the onset of the study, children showed higher PGU in Spanish and lower PGU in English. Growth curve analysis indicated that PGU in English improved over time, whereas PGU in Spanish declined in both instructional groups. However, those children who were in bilingual programs showed a slower rate of decline in Spanish PGU and a slower rate of improvement in English PGU. By the age of 9 years, children in English-only programs had approximately a Spanish PGU of 65% in Spanish, whereas children in bilingual instruction had an average Spanish PGU of 80%. The improvement in English PGU was steady with a small difference in the rate of growth benefiting children in English-only programs. Conclusion The results of this study document a shift in language proficiency from Spanish to English during the school years. This study offers evidence of a temporary period of relatively low grammaticality in both languages that seems to be the result of a shift in proficiency from Spanish to English.

Speech and Language Therapy Services for Multilingual Children with Migration Background: A Cross-Sectional Survey in Germany

Speech, language, and communication needs are particularly common among multilingual and migrant children. More than every third child in Germany has a migrant background. In the city of Bremen, this figure is even higher, including refugee children. The availability of comprehensive data on the provision and uptake of speech and language therapy (SLT) services is still inadequate, especially for multilingual children. However, health-monitoring programs report that migrants differ in many health-related areas from the majority population, mainly in barriers in health care. This study examines the current provision of SLT services for multilingual children following a medical prescription for the specific case of suspected language disorder. Information was obtained from speech-language pathologists (SLPs) representing 28 practices in different districts across one of the moderately largest cities affected by sociospatial polarization. The SLT practices were clustered according to the proportion of minor migrants and minor welfare recipients in the district. The survey included the number and proportion of multilingual children on the SLT caseloads, as well as the age of children by time of referral, physician and SLP diagnoses, application and type of assessment materials, intervention goals, and sociodemographic data of practicing SLPs. Questionnaire responses were analyzed using descriptive statistics and an explanatory interpretive approach. Findings suggest that multilingual children experience later referral compared to monolingual German-speaking children, with approximately half of the multilingual children demonstrating a developmental language disorder (DLD). The SLP's level of experience determines the accuracy of differential diagnosis between communication disorders and typical linguistic variations. Consequently, participation in continuing education focusing on service provision of the multilingual and multicultural clientele is essential. This study highlights the obstacles and the needs for increased multiprofessional awareness and an enhanced professional knowledge to provide effective and swift diagnosis earlier to allow multilingual children with a DLD to access relevant services on equal terms with native resident children.

Understanding Disorder Within Variation: Production of English Grammatical Forms by English Language Learners

Purpose

This study examines English performance on a set of 11 grammatical forms in Spanish-English bilingual, school-age children in order to understand how item difficulty of grammatical constructions helps correctly classify language impairment (LI) from expected variability in second language acquisition when taking into account linguistic experience and exposure.

Method

Three hundred seventy-eight children's scores on the Bilingual English-Spanish Assessment-Middle Extension (Peña, Bedore, Gutiérrez-Clellen, Iglesias, & Goldstein, 2008) morphosyntax cloze task were analyzed by bilingual experience groups (high Spanish experience, balanced English-Spanish experience, high English experience, ability (typically developing [TD] vs. LI), and grammatical form. Classification accuracy was calculated for the forms that best differentiated TD and LI groups.

Results

Children with LI scored lower than TD children across all bilingual experience groups. There were differences by grammatical form across bilingual experience and ability groups. Children from high English experience and balanced English-Spanish experience groups could be accurately classified on the basis of all the English grammatical forms tested except for prepositions. For bilinguals with high Spanish experience, it was possible to rule out LI on the basis of grammatical production but not rule in LI.

Conclusions

It is possible to accurately identify LI in English language learners once they use English 40% of the time or more. However, for children with high Spanish experience, more information about development and patterns of impairment is needed to positively identify LI.

Identifying risk for language impairment in children from linguistically diverse low-income schools

PURPOSE

To improve screening procedures for children in a linguistically diverse context, we combined tasks known to reveal grammatical deficits in children with language impairment (LI) with training to facilitate performance on a verb elicitation task.

METHOD

Sixty-four first grade children participated. The objective grammatical measures included elicitation of 12 past tense regular verbs preceded by a teaching phase (teach-test), the sentence recall (SR) subtest of the Clinical evaluation of language fundamentals (CELF-4), and a tally of all conjugated verbs from a narrative retell task. Given the widespread reliance on teacher observation for the referral of children suspected of having LI, we compared our results to the spoken language portion of the CELF-4 teacher observational rating scale (ORS).

RESULT

Using teacher observation as a reference for comparison, the past tense elicitation task and the SR task yielded strong discriminating power, but the verb tally was relatively weak. However, combining the three tasks yielded the highest levels of sensitivity (75%) and specificity (92%) than any single measure on its own.

CONCLUSION

This study contributes to alternative assessment practices by highlighting the potential utility of adding a teaching component prior to administering informal grammatical probes.

Language Abilities in Monolingual- and Bilingual- Exposed Children with Autism or Other Developmental Disorders

BACKGROUND

Parents and providers are sometimes concerned that exposure to two languages will impair language acquisition in children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) or other developmental disorders (DD). However, research to date suggests that language milestones and abilities are unaffected by this exposure. The current study explored language abilities in toddlers with ASD or DD exposed to one versus multiple languages, prior to intervention. To our knowledge, this is the largest investigation of language learning in bilingual-exposed (BE) children with ASD.

METHODS

Participants were 388 children evaluated as part of a larger study on the early detection of ASD. Parents were asked to list all languages that primary caretakers use to communicate with their child. One hundred six BE children (57 ASD, 49 DD) were compared to 282 monolingual-exposed (ME) children (176 ASD, 106 DD). The Mullen Scales of Early Learning assessed nonverbal and verbal abilities. Multiple regression was used to evaluate the relationship of BE to language abilities, beyond the influence of nonverbal cognitive abilities, diagnosis, and socioeconomic status.

RESULTS

Results showed greater language impairment in ASD than DD, but no main effect for language exposure group nor any interaction of language group by diagnosis. Results remained consistent after controlling for socioeconomic status.

CONCLUSION

This study suggests that bilingual caregivers can communicate with their children in both languages without adverse effects on their children's language functioning.

Mehrsprachiges Aufwachsen und Sprachentwicklungsstörungen. Eine Übersichtsarbeit

Zusammenfassung. Für viele Kinder mit Migrationshintergrund ist das Erlernen der Zweitsprache im Aufnahmeland eine bedeutende Hürde für den Bildungserfolg. Durch die Vielzahl der Sprachen, die noch nicht detailliert linguistisch beschrieben sind, ist die Entwicklung von entsprechenden validen und reliablen Diagnoseinstrumenten und Screeningverfahren äußerst erschwert. Daraus entsteht ein diagnostisches Dilemma, da Kinder mit Erwerbsproblemen der Zweitsprache mit sprachentwicklungsgestörten Kindern (engl. Specific language impairment [SLI]) verwechselt werden können. Kinder mit Migrationshintergrund können linguistische Profile aufweisen, die oberflächlich an Kinder mit Sprachentwicklungsstörung erinnern. Der vorliegende Übersichtsartikel stellt ein selektives Review der relevanten Literatur dar und bietet Vorschläge für den Umgang mit den entsprechenden Herausforderungen. Es wird davon ausgegangen, dass die Prävalenz für die Sprachentwicklungsstörung bei mehrsprachig aufwachsenden Kindern nicht höher ist als bei einsprachig aufwachsenden Kindern und mehrsprachig aufwachsende Kinder ebenfalls subtile kognitive Schwächen zeigen können. Die Bedeutung von Sprachentwicklungsstörungen bei psychiatrisch erkrankten einsprachig und mehrsprachig aufwachsenden Kindern ist hinreichend belegt und muss bei der umfassenden Diagnostik mitbedacht werden. Eine essenzielle Maßnahme für jene Kinder mit Migrationshintergrund, die größere Probleme beim Erwerb der Zweitsprache haben, ist eine Sprachdiagnostik in der jeweiligen Muttersprache.

Tense and plural formation in Welsh-English bilingual children with and without language impairment

BACKGROUND

Grammatical morphology has been shown to be problematic for children with specific language impairment (SLI) or developmental language disorder (DLD). Most research on this topic comes from widely spoken languages, such as English. Despite Welsh being the most extensively spoken indigenous in the UK after English, and Wales being the only official bilingual country in the UK, our knowledge about the morphosyntactic areas of Welsh that may pose problems for Welsh-speaking children with SLI is limited. Currently, Welsh-speaking speech and language therapists (SLTs) are heavily reliant on the use of informally translated English assessments. This can inadvertently result in a failure to take aspects of Welsh morphosyntax into account that are critical for the assessment and treatment of Welsh-speaking children.

AIMS

This is the first study to examine how Welsh-English bilingual children of early school age with typical development (bi-TD) and with SLI (bi-SLI) perform on production tasks targeting verbal and nominal morphology in Welsh. We targeted areas of Welsh morphosyntax that could potentially be vulnerable for Welsh-speaking children with or at risk of language impairment, such as tense marking and plural formation, and assessed their diagnostic potential.

METHODS & PROCEDURES

Twenty-eight Welsh-dominant bilingual children participated in the study: 10 bi-SLI and 18 bi-TD. They were administered three elicitation tasks targeting the production of verbal (compound and synthetic past tense) and nominal (plural) morphology in Welsh.

OUTCOMES & RESULTS

The bi-SLI children performed worse than their bi-TD peers across all three tasks. They produced more uninflected verbs in the elicited-production task and were less likely to be prompted to produce the synthetic past, which is a concatenating, low-frequency form of the past tense. They also over-regularized less in the context of plural nouns, and when they did, they opted for high-frequency suffixes.

CONCLUSIONS & IMPLICATIONS

By focusing on aspects of morphosyntactic development which are unique to Welsh, we have increased existing about how verbal and nominal morphology are acquired in Welsh-speaking bi-SLI and bi-TD children. The present results point towards productivity problems for Welsh-speaking bi-SLI children who are adversely influenced by low-frequency structures and fail to over-regularize in the context of verbal and nominal concatenating morphology. From a clinical perspective, targeting synthetic past-tense forms through a prompting task may be a promising assessment and intervention tool that future studies could explore further.

Prologue: Toward Accurate Identification of Developmental Language Disorder Within Linguistically Diverse Schools

Purpose

Although the 5 studies presented within this clinical forum include children who differ widely in locality, language learning profile, and age, all were motivated by a desire to improve the accuracy at which developmental language disorder is identified within linguistically diverse schools. The purpose of this prologue is to introduce the readers to a conceptual framework that unites the studies while also highlighting the approaches and methods each research team is pursuing to improve assessment outcomes within their respective linguistically diverse community.

Method

A disorder within diversity framework is presented to replace previous difference vs. disorder approaches. Then, the 5 studies within the forum are reviewed by clinical question, type of tool(s), and analytical approach.

Conclusion

Across studies of different linguistically diverse groups, research teams are seeking answers to similar questions about child language screening and diagnostic practices, using similar analytical approaches to answer their questions, and finding promising results with tools focused on morphosyntax. More studies that are modeled after or designed to extend those in this forum are needed to improve the accuracy at which developmental language disorder is identified.

In few words: linguistic gap but adequate narrative structure in preschool bilingual children

The aim of this study was to compare linguistic and narrative skills of monolingual and bilingual preschoolers and to estimate linguistic predictors of the macro-structural level of narratives. A battery of linguistic measures in Italian was administered to sixty-four Monolinguals and sixty-four Early Bilinguals; it included Vocabulary, Phonological Awareness, Morphosyntactic Comprehension, Phonological Memory, Letter Knowledge, and Story Sequencing tasks. The narratives produced in the Story Sequencing task were coded. Bilinguals underachieved, compared to monolinguals, in vocabulary, phonological awareness and morphosyntactic comprehension; they also differed in Type and Token indexes and in free morphology, but not in the level of macro-structural complexity. Macro-structural parameters were predicted by Mean Length of Utterances in monolinguals, but not in bilinguals. Bilingual children are able to structure stories in their L2 with monolingual-like cohesive complexity, although 'in few words', that is, with weak L2 linguistic skills.

Phase 2 of CATALISE: a multinational and multidisciplinary Delphi consensus study of problems with language development: Terminology

BACKGROUND

Lack of agreement about criteria and terminology for children's language problems affects access to services as well as hindering research and practice. We report the second phase of a study using an online Delphi method to address these issues. In the first phase, we focused on criteria for language disorder. Here we consider terminology.

METHODS

The Delphi method is an iterative process in which an initial set of statements is rated by a panel of experts, who then have the opportunity to view anonymised ratings from other panel members. On this basis they can either revise their views or make a case for their position. The statements are then revised based on panel feedback, and again rated by and commented on by the panel. In this study, feedback from a second round was used to prepare a final set of statements in narrative form. The panel included 57 individuals representing a range of professions and nationalities.

RESULTS

We achieved at least 78% agreement for 19 of 21 statements within two rounds of ratings. These were collapsed into 12 statements for the final consensus reported here. The term 'Language Disorder' is recommended to refer to a profile of difficulties that causes functional impairment in everyday life and is associated with poor prognosis. The term, 'Developmental Language Disorder' (DLD) was endorsed for use when the language disorder was not associated with a known biomedical aetiology. It was also agreed that (a) presence of risk factors (neurobiological or environmental) does not preclude a diagnosis of DLD, (b) DLD can co-occur with other neurodevelopmental disorders (e.g. ADHD) and (c) DLD does not require a mismatch between verbal and nonverbal ability.

CONCLUSIONS

This Delphi exercise highlights reasons for disagreements about terminology for language disorders and proposes standard definitions and nomenclature.

Tense Marking in the English Narrative Retells of Dual Language Preschoolers

Purpose

This longitudinal study investigated the emergence of English tense marking in young (Spanish–English) dual language learners (DLLs) over 4 consecutive academic semesters, addressing the need for longitudinal data on typical acquisition trajectories of English in DLL preschoolers.

Method

Language sample analysis was conducted on 139 English narrative retells elicited from 39 preschool-age (Spanish–English) DLLs (range = 39–65 months). Growth curve models captured within- and between-individual change in tense-marking accuracy over time. Tense-marking accuracy was indexed by the finite verb morphology composite and by 2 specifically developed adaptations. Individual tense markers were systematically described in terms of overall accuracy and specific error patterns.

Results

Tense-marking accuracy exhibited significant growth over time for each composite. Initially, irregular past-tense accuracy was higher than regular past-tense accuracy; over time, however, regular past-tense marking outpaced accuracy on irregular verbs.

Conclusions

These findings suggest that young DLLs can achieve high tense-marking accuracy assuming 2 years of immersive exposure to English. Monitoring the growth in tense-marking accuracy over time and considering productive tense-marking errors as partially correct more precisely captured the emergence of English tense marking in this population with highly variable expressive language skills.

Supplemental Materials

https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.5176942

Assessment of bilingual children: What if testing both languages is not possible?

Language delays of bilingual children can arise from language impairment (LI) but also from insufficient exposure to the target language. A reliable diagnosis of LI in bilingual children is therefore ideally based on the evaluation of both languages, as LI affects each language that is learned. However, due to the multitude of language combinations that are encountered in clinical practice, this is often not feasible. Bilingual norm-referencing may offer a solution, but the heterogeneity within the bilingual population makes it difficult to determine appropriate standards for every child. The present study examined an alternative approach to assessing both languages or using bilingual norm-referencing, aiming to assemble instruments that reduce bias against bilingual children. We used a four-group design, including monolingual and bilingual children with and without LI (N=132), to first investigate the effects of LI and bilingualism on risks associated with a child's early language development and the prevalence of language problems in the family, as reported by parents. Second, we evaluated the diagnostic validity of these two indices, and, in addition, combined these with two unbiased language measures which we previously examined in isolation: a quasi-universal nonword repetition task and a narrative task. Results showed that the index of Early Language Development was a strong predictor of LI. In combination with the two direct language measures, it excellently identified the presence or absence of LI in and across monolingual and bilingual learning contexts.

LEARNING OUTCOMES

As a result of this study, the reader will learn about an alternative approach to testing a bilingual child in both languages. The reader will recognize the importance of using unbiased measures for the identification of LI in a bilingual context, and, in addition, will appreciate the value of combining parental report with direct language measures.

Professional practices and opinions about services available to bilingual children with developmental disabilities: An international study

This study aimed to gather information from school- and clinic-based professionals about their practices and opinions pertaining to the provision of bilingual supports to students with developmental disabilities. Using an online survey, data were collected in six socio-culturally and linguistically diverse locations across four countries: the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, and the Netherlands. In total, 361 surveys were included in the analysis from respondents who were primarily teachers and speech-language pathologists working in schools, daycares/preschools, or community-based clinics. The overall picture that emerged from the data reflected a disconnection between practice and opinion. In general, respondents believed that children with both mild and severe disabilities are capable of learning a second language, although their opinions were more neutral for the latter group. However, children with both mild and severe disabilities who spoke only a minority language at home had less access to services for second language learners than did their typically developing peers, although respondents agreed that such services should be more available. Regardless of clinical group, children who lived in homes where a minority language was spoken were often exposed to, assessed in, and treated in the majority language only; again, respondents generally disagreed with these practices. Finally, second language classes were less available to children in the two disability groups compared to typically developing bilingual children, with general agreement that the opportunity to acquire a second language should be more available, especially to those with mild disabilities. Although the results indicate that there is a considerable gap between current practices and professional opinions, professionals appear to be more supportive of bilingual educational opportunities for these populations than was suggested by previous research.

CATALISE: A Multinational and Multidisciplinary Delphi Consensus Study. Identifying Language Impairments in Children

Delayed or impaired language development is a common developmental concern, yet there is little agreement about the criteria used to identify and classify language impairments in children. Children's language difficulties are at the interface between education, medicine and the allied professions, who may all adopt different approaches to conceptualising them. Our goal in this study was to use an online Delphi technique to see whether it was possible to achieve consensus among professionals on appropriate criteria for identifying children who might benefit from specialist services. We recruited a panel of 59 experts representing ten disciplines (including education, psychology, speech-language therapy/pathology, paediatrics and child psychiatry) from English-speaking countries (Australia, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand, United Kingdom and USA). The starting point for round 1 was a set of 46 statements based on articles and commentaries in a special issue of a journal focusing on this topic. Panel members rated each statement for both relevance and validity on a seven-point scale, and added free text comments. These responses were synthesised by the first two authors, who then removed, combined or modified items with a view to improving consensus. The resulting set of statements was returned to the panel for a second evaluation (round 2). Consensus (percentage reporting 'agree' or 'strongly agree') was at least 80 percent for 24 of 27 round 2 statements, though many respondents qualified their response with written comments. These were again synthesised by the first two authors. The resulting consensus statement is reported here, with additional summary of relevant evidence, and a concluding commentary on residual disagreements and gaps in the evidence base.