Development of Language and Pragmatic Communication Skills in Preschool Children with Developmental Language Disorder in a Speech Therapy Kindergarten-A Real-World Study.

backgroundSeveral studies document the importance of communicative abilities for children's development. Especially in recent years verbal communication in preschool children with developmental language disorder (DLD) has been studied, relying heavily on statistical analysis, outcome measures, or/and parents' reports. PURPOSE: This explorative study investigates the effects of speech therapy on the development of language and verbal communication skills in preschool children with DLD within their peer group in a day-to-day setting using objective video-documentation. HYPOTHESIS: Speech therapy leads to improvement of language, communication, and possibly to concurrent development of both language and verbal communication skills in preschool children.

methodsPreliminary prospective study to assess language and verbal communications skills of nine preschool children (seven boys, two girls, 4-6 y) with DLD in a speech therapy kindergarten using video recordings over a one-year therapy period. The communicative participation of the members of the peer group was assessed and included the verbal address (Av) and the ratio of "verbal address/verbal reaction" (Av/Rv).

resultsThe investigation results in evidence for two outcome groups: One group with suspected preferential verbal communication disorders (

conclusionsThe present study clearly shows that even with speech-language therapy, the linguistic ability of DLD-disturbed children does not necessarily develop simultaneously with their communication ability. Rather, the investigations provide evidence for two groups of preschool children with DLD and communication disorder: One group demonstrated a predominantly verbal communication related disorder, where pedagogical intervention might be the more important treatment. The second group showed predominantly DLD, therefore making speech therapy the more effective intervention. In this study, all children expressed their desire to communicate with their peers. To the authors' best knowledge, this is the first study determining the ability to communicate in a preschool cohort with DLD using characterisation with video documentation in a follow-up for 1 year.