Background: Communication impairments are a leading concern for parent caregivers of individuals with rare neurodevelopmental disorders (RNDDs). Clinical trials of disease modifying therapies require valid and responsive outcome measures that are relevant to individuals with RNDDs. Identifying and evaluating current psychometric properties for…

Purpose: Children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) are at increased risk of experiencing difficulties with the development of literacy, including the emergent literacy skills recognized to underpin conventional literacy success. Comprehensive assessment is essential. Characteristics of ASD can make assessment challenging, and this can be…

Children with Angelman syndrome (AS) exhibit significant social, communicative and cognitive difficulties. The aim of this case study was to describe the profile of communicative abilities of a child with AS, before and after the implementation of the Hanen program "More than Words" (MTW). Additionally, changes on the language directed…

The Iowa Severity Rating Scales are designed to provide general guidelines which may be used as a part of the clinical speech and language program to obtain uniform identification of preschool children with communication disabilities. Section 1 contains definitions, an explanation of the severity classification (a 5 point scale ranging from 0 for…

A screening method for distinguishing speech and language disordered children (2 to 15 years old) with and without psychiatric disorders (N=256) involved cutoff scores for an easily administered parent and teacher behavior rating questionnaire. (CL)

This article describes an environmental inventory, "Analyzing the Communication Environment," which allows the evaluator to analyze the extent to which specific activities encourage functional communication for particular students with severe communication impairments. The inventory may be used to compare different activities across the student's…

This study investigated two pragmatic profiles (the Pragmatic Profile and the Profile of Communicative Appropriateness) used to assess the language of two aphasic patients. The study examined interscorer reliability, scoring sensitivity, and diagnostic accuracy. Findings indicate that training in scoring these profiles must be uniform, and greater…

This article describes two studies that examined the concurrent and predictive validity of the Communication and Symbolic Behavior Scales Developmental Profile (CSBS DP), a measure for identifying children less than 24 months old who are at risk for communication disorders. Findings support the use of prelinguistic predictors and the important…

This article describes the development and possible applications of the Teacher Assessment of Student Communicative Competencies (TASCC) for use with students in the first through fifth grades. The TASCC allowed 20 teachers to successfully observe and measure their students' verbal and nonverbal communicative abilities and use of compensatory…

Describes the Communication and Symbolic Behavior Scales, a standardized assessment for infants, toddlers and preschool children. It is designed to identify children at risk of developing a communication impairment and to establish a profile of functioning in the areas of communicative, social-affective, and symbolic abilities. (CR)

This study found that the Davis Observation Checklist for Texas, an observational teacher checklist for screening preschool children for communication disorders, demonstrated adequate sensitivity and specificity. The concurrent validity of the checklist was assessed with 59 multicultural children (ages 4 through 5), including Mexican Americans,…

LEGO[C] building materials have been adapted as a therapeutic modality for increasing motivation to participate in social skills intervention, and providing a medium through which children with social and communication handicaps can effectively interact. A 3 year retrospective study of long-term outcome for autistic spectrum children participating…

This newsletter issue contains four articles all addressing aspects of intervention with infants and toddlers having communication disorders. The first, "Assessing the Communication of Infants and Toddlers: Integrating a Socioemotional Perspective" (Barry M. Prizant and Amy M. Wetherby) describes a new instrument, the Communication and Symbolic…

This practicum employed a systematic series of activities to assist special education middle school students (n=16) in making successful transitions from special classes into regular classes. Students were identified as either gifted-handicapped or communication disordered. Weekly class meetings were held in which general social skills issues were…