Background: Outcomes of static tests provide an indication of what children have learned in the past, up to the moment of testing, and can therefore underestimate the cognitive abilities of atypically developing children, such as children with language difficulties. In contrast, dynamic tests aim to examine children's potential for learning. The…

This study applied the dynamic assessment (DA) of narratives in a bilingual Spanish- and English-speaking early elementary population. We examined transfer and change in narrative performance within and across languages after mediated learning experience (MLE) in Spanish or English. Sixty-eight bilingual children were randomized to two groups:…

We investigated the associations between teacher-rated and direct assessments of early elementary students' speech and language skills to explore whether using teachers as primary screeners yielded assessment data that reliably identified young students with language difficulties who many need a more comprehensive evaluation. We assessed first-…

Comorbidity between SLI and dyslexia is well documented. Researchers have variously argued that dyslexia is a separate disorder from SLI, or that children with dyslexia show a subset of the difficulties shown in SLI. This study examines these hypotheses by assessing whether family history of dyslexia and speech and language difficulties are…

Children who have sensory, cognitive or oromotor deficits, or come from a bilingual-speaking background are currently excluded from the diagnosis of specific language impairment (SLI). Emerging evidence, however, suggests that at least 7% of all children have language learning difficulties, irrespective of other diagnoses or language learning…

This study compared the abilities of children with specific language impairment (SLI; n=10) and typically developing (TD) children (n=13) to access and participate in an ongoing interaction between two unfamiliar peer partners. Results revealed that all children in the study accessed by either making an unprompted initiation toward their peers…