Many people assume that once a child can effectively communicate his wants or needs, his communication skills are within normal limits.  Some assume that the difference in a person's ability to communicate has more to due with their level of social skills as opposed to the depth and strength of his language skills.  There are a large number of adolescents who have language impairments but are rarely identified which means they are not receiving needed services.  Also, these children often struggle in school and are accused of being lazy or encouraged to simply work harder or study more.  Unfortunately, these kids are often already working extremely hard is they haven't completely given up.  Below are some characteristics of this population of children.  

Adolescents identified with a language disorder often include:

• those initially identified through early intervention programs
• reduced the severity of the problem 
• “remediated”
• those who never received intervention
• those who had normal language but experienced a disruption because of some physical, emotional, or traumatic event
• those who have been identified as having a learning disability

 

Characteristics of Adolescent Language Disorder

1. Failure to understand or pay attention to rules of conversation, for example, turn taking, introducing topics or conversation, and staying on topic
   
2. Difficulty using different language for different needs of the listener or situation
   
3. Incorrect use of grammar
   
4. Poor or limited vocabulary
   
5. Difficulty requesting further information to aid understanding
   
6. Tendency to ask questions that are to general
   
7. Tendency to agree rather than to voice oppositions
   
8. Indirect requests and ambiguous statements
   
9. Class clown behavior
   
10. Extreme forgetfulness
    
11. Withdrawal or exclusion from group activities
    
12. Difficulty with
13. Understanding nonverbal behaviors
14. Difficulty with....

• finding word
  
• puns, idioms, riddles, jokes, sarcasm, and slang
  
• instructions, especially those that are long or grammatically complex
  
• words with multiple meanings
  
• sequencing
  
• expressing thoughts
  
• organizing information
  

Pragmatics is the communicative use of language especially in social interactions.  The three major communication skills that make up pragmatic language are using language for different purposes, changing language according to the needs of the listener or situation, and following rules for conversation and storytelling.    Pragmatics has focused on the development of children’s ability to infer meaning from utterances as they mature.

Expressive language not only includes a measure of the form and content of language, but it also measures the third aspect of language, the use.  Successful and effective communication depends on adequate expressive language skills and pragmatic language skills.   Verbal and nonverbal pragmatic deficits may negatively influence social and academic communication.  Pragmatic language is using language socially.  It is the ultimate application of one’s language abilities to effectively communicate in order to express wants and needs and to develop and maintain relationships with peers and adults.  There are three major components necessary for successful pragmatic language skills.  One must understand the use for language for different purposes, changing and adjusting one’s language according to the needs of the listener, and following rules for conversations and storytelling. Students who perform poorly on measures of pragmatic language have either not experienced the use of pragmatically appropriate language or have not been able to generalize, from the world around them, the information needed to develop competence and skills for effective communication.

Semantics refers to the study of the meaning in language (the relationship between language and thought).  Knowledge of semantics involves the understanding of how meaning is conveyed through words and sentences.  Vocabulary, an important part of semantics, refers to the words in a language or to the words in a student’s repertoire.  The application of semantic knowledge allows the student to comprehend sentences when the meaning of the sentence is dependent upon the circumstances in which it is uttered.  Because the transmission of meaning from self to others is the purpose of language, knowledge of words and their relationships to other words can be considered the backbone of spoken communication.

The content of language, semantics, refers to the meaning of language.  This is very important not only for successful communication but also for reading and writing.

Semantic development is often limited to vocabulary (word) understanding and expression.  However, semantic language skills are critical for not only understanding but also using language.  Semantics is the depth of understanding of known words, which is vital for continuous and age appropriate growth of ones vocabulary.  Semantics is not just content and meaning but it also governs the meanings of words and word combinations. Students with semantic delays will experience difficulty learning new words, demonstrate poor flexibility in word usage, experience difficulty with storage and organization of known words, and struggle to access and retrieve words efficiently.  Students with semantic delays will experience difficulty generalizing or transferring knowledge and often fail to grasp important points in a conversation.  These students will also experience delays in reading comprehension and written expression.  A delay in semantic language can have a significant and negative impact on academic progress and success especially in later elementary, middle, and high school.  At that point students are expected to be proficient readers and will be exposed to a variety of new words in books, stories, and content related texts.  An inability to develop strong content related vocabulary skills will interfere with learning new concepts.

Often when we think of a child’s communication skills we think of how well we understanding the child (speech intelligibility or articulation) and hos language skills (receptive and expressive).  There are many other components of language that are important to consider as a child gets older.  Language development continues thorough out ones life and as we age the form, content, and use of language becomes increasingly important.

The form and content of language are two of the three aspects of language.  The form of language refers to the structural aspect of language.  It refers to the organization, placement, and relationship of the words used.  It is the “rules” that govern language, which is syntax (grammar).  Syntax is the order of words as well as accurate grammar.  Comprehension and expression is aided by the meaning that syntax adds to a sentence.  Therefore in order to formulate sentences that not only convey a precise meaning a child must have understanding of basic vocabulary.  The understanding of the vocabulary and the meaning different grammatical phonemes have is required so that a child can organize information.

Grammar is an area of language that is closely related to syntax, however, it is very important to recognize the vocabulary component of grammar.  Grammar is more closely related to a vocabulary skill than a syntactic skill because grammar is the understanding and use of grammatical morphemes.  Grammatical morphemes are prepositions, plurals, possessives, verb number and tense, noun-verb agreement, pronouns etc.  The correct usage of these elements not only influence the overall meaning of the message communicated but they also change the specific meaning or vocabulary of the word.

If a child does not have the basic understanding of how grammatical morphemes change the overall meaning of the vocabulary then the child will experience significantly more difficult with syntax.   The specific grammar features aid in meaning of the word but also provide clues for the word order or syntax of a sentence.

Many assume that once a person can talk and effectively communicate, his or her language skills are developed.  This is very misleading.  There are many aspects of language that are often overlooked especially when trying to understand why a child is struggling in school.  There are 3 main components of language and within those components there are other aspects of language that are critical not only for successful communication but also for academic success.  These aspects of language continue to grow and develop throughout ones life.

1. The form of language - Syntax and Grammar 
2. The content of language - Semantics
3. The use of language - Pragmatics

It is important to always assess all areas of language because sometimes even the most subtle weakness or impairment can have a negative impact on a child's academic progress.