Emerging literacy in children with delayed speech and language development: assessment and intervention

Abstract

Emerging literacy in preschool children has been shown to be inter-related with spoken language acquisition, particularly in joint picture-book reading with parents (PBR). In earlier studies of normally developing children a develop mental continuum of skills was described and then used to develop a checklist for assessing PBR in clinical populations. The checklist was used to study PBR in 11 language delayed children with varying degrees of attention control. The five children with receptive/expressive delay and difficulty with attention control were delayed in PBR but those with expressive difficulties were not. Suggestions for intervention are provided.