Language
Early Development of Expressive Language:
Expressive language is the way that we put words into sentences to express meaning, thoughts and ideas. As a simple rule, we expect children to:
- Be starting one word sentences by 1 year
- 2 word sentences by 2 years
- 3 word sentences by 3 years
Early Development of Receptive Language:
Receptive Language or language comprehension are the terms we use for the understanding of spoken language. As a simple rule, we expect children to:
- By 12 months - Understand simple, familiar instructions, which may include gesture. E.g. “Look at Daddy”, “Bath time.”, “Get the ball.”
- By 2 years - Understands simple commands like “Show me your nose” and has a vocabulary of 150-200 words.
- By 3 years - Understands simple questions about objects, function, family and environment. Starting to develop reasoning related to “who, what and where” questions e.g. “Who dropped the ball?”; “What colour is the pencil?” etc
- By the time your child starts school
What are Language Problems?
Language problems can be in expressive language, receptive language or mixed. Language problems are usually described as happening in the following areas:
Syntax:
Disorders of syntax (oral and written grammar) are difficulties using and/or comprehending the structural components of sentences.
Semantics:
Semantic difficulties involve problems with word meanings and knowledge as well as the organisation of spoken and written language. School based semantic problems include difficulties with comprehending written and spoken language, poor vocabulary skills, word finding difficulties and problems using context to help with reading comprehension.
Pragmatics:
This is the ability to use language as a social tool – ie the ability to use language as a means to interact with others socially or for a specific purpose (e.g. requesting information, expressing feelings, holding a conversation with others of differing ages).
Metalinguistics:
This is the ability to reflect on language as an object – to know that language is a rule bound code e.g. recognition of humour, multimeaning in words, ambiguity, figurative language (metaphors, similes, idioms etc), ability to segment words into syllables or phonemes (phonemic awareness).
Other common speech and language issues
High Level Language Problems:
High level, or subtle, language problems in children and adolescents are generally found in students who have coped reasonably well in the school system until a certain point in their education. Then they find that they are no longer able to cope with the language demands of the curriculum and start to fail in language based areas. These students may have never previously been identified with language difficulties.
Problems include –
- Difficulties getting information from reading texts (poor reading comprehension)
- Word finding difficulties and/or poor general vocabulary skills
- Over literal interpretation of language - resulting in a poor understanding of puns, riddles, idioms, jokes, sarcasm and inferred meaning
- Weak verbal reasoning and critical thinking skills
- Difficulties with cohesive writing for reports, assignments, projects and essays.
Auditory Processing and Listening Problems:
This includes specific auditory processing problems as well as difficulties with listening. The individual may have:
- short term auditory memory weaknesses; problems following instructions – from simple to complex
- difficulties listening to and processing instructions at the same speed as their peers
- difficulty listening in distracting environments, e.g. the classroom
- difficulty listening for information when someone else is reading or talking – they miss out on the details or get the details but are unable to grasp the “main idea”
- problems getting information from reading (reading comprehension).
A severe auditory processing problem is called a “Central Auditory Processing Disorder” (CAPD). This can be informally diagnosed by a Speech Pathologist, but is formally diagnosed with testing done by an Audiologist.