Observation of five infants' vocalizations during their first 30 weeks showed that hearing impaired infants displayed different language patterns than normally hearing infants. Developmental differences in vocal activity were observed by six weeks, suggesting that hearing impaired infants may differ from unimpaired infants earlier than has been…

The author outlines the implications of a linguistic-functions approach for language intervention with handicapped children. Among topics considered are language assessment and programing for nonverbal children with some language, language programing for low-level profoundly retarded children, and the integration of language into other activities.…

Parents of six developmentally delayed young childen (one- to four-years-old) significantly increased their use of five language stimulation techniques (referencing, parallel talking, questioning, replying, and demanding) as a result of a 10-week parent training course. (CL)

A profoundly retarded adolescent acquired 14 new verbal labels while playing a table game which required correct labeling of pictured stimuli for player movement. In addition, the subject's leisure skills were strengthened. (Author/CL)

Examines whether four- to six-year-old children are sensitive to the contextual influence of previous discourse on judgements of adequacy of referential communication. Findings show the children could discriminate between the functionally informative and ambiguous communications. (EKN)

The case study of a language handicapped 4-year-old presents a framework for assessing and managing a child who displayed a marked deficit in his verbal requests for objects, actions, and information. (Author/SW)

Language training for severely developmentally delayed children in the home should be as undisruptive as possible and should use natural training contexts, emphasize functional responses, and provide natural reinforcers or consequences. After identifying the communicative contexts, teaching the response is accomplished through reinforcement,…

Discusses spontaneous conversational situation in which a child recognizes the difference between his/her output and the adult model and his/her ensuing struggle in arriving at a new phonological rule to correct his/her utterances. (EKN)

Immediate discriminative control by spoken words was examined in a profoundly retarded, mute young man. Procedures suggested a potentially errorless, efficient teaching method for individuals without fundamental language. (Author/SB)

An information processing model was used to examine the coding and language functions of 88 institutionalized, moderately, and severely retarded persons. Contextual grammatical structures were found to relate to sequential processing, whereas comprehension and expression of relational thought was related to both sequential processing and…

The article presents a summary of the language characteristics of autistic children and relates them to existing research supporting both sign alone and sign plus speech as viable training modes. Procedures for determining the optimal sign teaching mode for a given child are also discussed. (Author/SB)

Questions Piaget's theory that young children's speech is primarily egocentric. Suggests their speech can be highly socialized or sociocentric as early as age two. Examines the relationship between egocentric and sociocentric speech within the context of the social theory of language acquisition and provides conclusions and implications for the…

The paper describes how microcomputer courseware can be developed to provide interactive receptive language testing and training materials for the bilingual, language handicapped child. A description of a prototype program which has been used to both test and train language impaired children is provided. (Author)

A teacher of hearing impaired eight-year-olds describes the use of a microcomputer in fostering students' language and arithmetic skills. Sample programs focus on scrambled sentences, comprehension, sentences, spelling, money value, and story problems. (CL)

Research with 24 infants revealed that reduplication is a general pattern during the earliest stages of phonological development, used most frequently by children who follow a multisyllabic rather than monosyllabic course of development. (Author)