Immigrant Children often Misdiagnosed As Language-impaired

[Harold F. Schiffman]

Immigrant Children Misdiagnosed As Language-impaired

ScienceDaily (Aug. 25, 2005)  Immigrant children still mastering the
English language risk being shuffled into special education services they
don't need, because of errors in assessment for speech problems, according
to a new University of Alberta study. The study showed that the expressive
language characteristics of typically developing children learning English
as a second language are similar to the English spoken by monolingual
children who have specific language impairment. "The errors they make when
they speak English are nearly identical to the errors children make when
they are language-impaired,"  said Dr. Johanne Paradis, a linguistics
professor at the University of Alberta.

The study appears in the July, 2005 edition of Language, Speech & Hearing
Services in Schools. In studying 24 children aged four to seven who have
been learning English as a second language for an average of 9.5 months,
Dr. Paradis discovered that their accuracy rates and error patterns were
similar to those reported in monolingual children who had been diagnosed
with speech language impairment. The children were tested in their usage
of verbs, prepositions and determiner words like 'a' and 'the'.

"The existing similarities, along with large individual differences in how
quickly children learn English, could result in misdiagnosis and therefore
be a cause of unnecessary referrals to speech therapy services," Dr.
Paradis said. This phenomenon could be part of a larger problem that has
been widely acknowledged in the United States that linguistic minority
children are statistically over-represented in all areas of special
education," said Dr. Paradis.

This overlap in linguistic characteristics between English second language
children and language-impaired children is an issue for many countries:
Canada, the U.S.A., the United Kingdom and Australia." And while it may
appear beneficial to have immigrant children enrolled for focused
linguistic attention by receiving therapy services, the youngsters may
suffer stigmatization, Paradis said. "Their parents may believe there is
something wrong with the child. And receiving special education services
can colour a child's education future and self-esteem."

Nor is it a good use of scarce resources for special education, Dr.
Paradis noted. "The services need to be there for the children who really
need them." The method of language testing for immigrant children must be
changed, Dr.  Paradis added. "The use of English standardized tests with
non-native English-speakers is not a good practice. You can't uncritically
use tests developed for native speakers with kids who have been exposed to
English for just one year." As part of the study, the children were
administered a standardized test for language development, and nearly all
of them scored as if they were language-impaired.

Young children learning English can be expected to make grammatical
errors, well into the second year of their experience speaking the
language, and more appropriate expectations need to be set when assessing
the youngsters, Paradis said. She suggested that instead of comparing
their skills to those of monolingual English-speaking children, they be
compared to the skills of their peers; other youngsters who are also
learning English as a second language.

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Paradis' study was funded by the Alberta Heritage Foundation for Medical
Research and by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of
Canada.

Adapted from materials provided by University of Alberta.

http://www.sciencedaily.com /releases/2005/08/050825071404.htm