Syntactical Language Assessment

Informal assessment of N~’s syntactic usage revealed syntactical difficulties. He predominately produced simple sentence during conversation (e.g. “my ear hurts”). N~’s syntax was negatively impacted by language formulation difficulties as his sentences deteriorated into fragments and short phrases that were linked with the connective “and”. He exhibited errors in subject-verb agreement during discourse (e.g. “I no feel good”) and in formalized testing (e.g., “pencil is do your homework”). According to Hoff (2005), by the time children are 4 years old, they typically produce complex sentences and essentially master the grammar of their language.

Informal assessment of structural knowledge indicated depressed language form for social communication purposes. At times, he would speak in simple sentences and fragments, especially when he was required to engage in extended language production. …show more content…
He required numerous verbal prompted and reinforcement to provide information upon request and demonstrated limited social reciprocity. In terms of pragmatics development, N~ conveyed limited speech acts that included discourse, comment, protest, routine, and report (Gerber, 1987). During conversational exchange, N~ mainly responded to the examiner’s questions and required verbal prompts to elaborate on his answers. According to Gerber (1987), a child of N~’s age is expected to use language to code for the following functions: regulate-obtain information, regulate-obtain participation/invite, discourse- feedback, discourse-repair, or discourse-initiate a topic or turn take. He exhibited depressed maintenance of conversational exchanges and frequently stated that he wanted to go home. In addition, when he stated “I am angry” and “I got nervous” he was asked follow-up questions (e.g., what does angry mean) and did not demonstrate an understanding of his