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<P class=MsoNormal style="TEXT-INDENT: 36pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt">In response to the recent
questions about whether there is any research being done on adopted children
from China, Rena Krakow, of Temple University, and Paul Wang, of Children's
Hospital of Philadelphia, and I<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN>have been investigating the language development of a 2 groups of adopted
children for the past 6 months.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>So
far, the results of one of our studies, conducted in collaboration with Karen
Pollock of Memphis State University, indicates remarkably good English language
skills in a group of 3-8 year old children, average or above average in most
areas.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>All of the children have
been exposed to English for at least 2 years, and some for substantially
longer.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>There is a smaller group of
children who score one to two standard deviations below the mean on a variety of
standardized tests.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>These children
are among the youngest studied.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN>Interestingly, their profiles resemble that of children typically
diagnosed with SLI, including difficulties with morphosyntax and sentence
repetition.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>At this preliminary
point, we believe this reflects a normal delay in the acquisition of a new
"second" language, and we intend to follow these children for an additional year
to see how these problems resolve.<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns =
"urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" /><o:p></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="TEXT-INDENT: 36pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt">In a second study of younger
children aged 16-26 months, we have found considerable variation in lexical
acquisition using parent-report measures of vocabulary, with some of the
children performing much like native-born children, and others showing
delays.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Of considerable interest is
the variation seen in a subset of 6 children, all adopted from the same
orphanage on<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>the same date and at
approximately the same age.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>The six
children are now all two years old. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Three of these children are showing
very typical vocabulary development, whereas three others are significantly
delayed.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>We are examining a number
of factors to try and identify the sources of variation in the sub-group and in
the group as whole.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Overall, we
feel that the results of these studies will be a significant addition to the
literature on the language status of internationally adopted children, and
represent a much more positive outcome than that which has been reported
previously about some internationally adopted children.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Recent research conducted by Sharon
Glennen of Towson University also finds primarily positive outcomes in a group
of children adopted from Eastern European countries.
<o:p></o:p></SPAN></P></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Jenny<BR>________________________________<BR>Jenny
Roberts, Ph.D.<BR>Department of Communication Sciences<BR>Temple
University</FONT></DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>phone: (215)-204-1871<BR>fax: (215)
204-5954<BR>e-mail: <A
href="mailto:jrober05@astro.temple.edu">jrober05@astro.temple.edu</A><BR></FONT></DIV></BODY></HTML>