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An Invited Article Facilitating linguistic skills in children with specific language impairment

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 November 2008

Laurence B. Leonard
Laurence B. Leonard*
Affiliation:
Purdue University
*
Laurence B. Leonard, Audiology & Speech Sciences, Heavilon Hall, Purdue University, W. Lafayette, IN 47907
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Abstract

This paper presents a critical review of studies designed to teach language production skills to children with specific language impairment. The evidence reviewed suggests that a number of training approaches are effective, often resulting in gains that exceed the rate seen in normal development. Close analysis of children’s post-treatment usage reveals that these gains go beyond rote learning, and may even result in response classes that are different from those seen in the adult linguistic system. The chief limitations in these training studies are that children seem to make use of the target linguistic form only in untrained utterances that share certain topographical features with the utterances used in training, and that there is little evidence that children’s use of the target form will extend to speaking situations that bear little resemblance to the training/testing situation.

Type
Articles
Information
Applied Psycholinguistics , Volume 2 , Issue 2 , May 1981 , pp. 89 - 118
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1981

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