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Home › Articles › Speech/Language Issues › Early Intervention Key in Language Development

Early Intervention Key in Language Development

By Jennifer Newton Reents

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Who Should Be Evaluated?
ASHA recommends children identified as at-risk or high risk, such as those from neonatal intensive care units, should be tested early and regularly.

childOther risk factors include children who have had chronic ear infections, or who have been diagnosed with Fetal Alcohol Syndrome, genetic defects such as Down syndrome, neurological defects such as cerebral palsy or developmental disorders.

"With toddlers, the first thing to look at is [if they are] hearing," Hudon says. "Are they startling to sounds? Are they looking toward sounds? Are they hearing your voice? Are there a lot of ear infections? Frequent ear infections can actually make your child hear [like he's] under water. It does and can affect speech development and sound productions."

Children with no high-risk factors should be evaluated if their speech and language is not similar to other children of the same age, ASHA recommends.

What Is an Evaluation?
Evaluations may include a number of tests, observation of the child at play and a collection of speech samples, if the child talks. Several sessions may be needed to obtain enough information to make a diagnosis by professionals such as speech-language pathologists, audiologists, psychologists and neurologists.

What Is Speech-Language Treatment?
It depends on the diagnosis. Remediation efforts, however, increase function in areas identified as delayed or disabling and may prevent other related problems, according to ASHA. For instance, the remediation of a language disorder can help offset learning difficulties.

Most often, treatment takes place in a natural setting and is presented at the child's developmental level. Play may be used to teach communication, language models or rules of conversation, such as turn taking.

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