ISSS News and Noteworthy
Descriptive Language Assessment:
Selected References

Student support services professionals are bombarded with an increasing number of standardized commercially available assessment procedures. Simultaneously, they are being challenged to evaluate children, adolescents, and young adults with procedures that are relevant to the student’s culture, classroom/curricular demands, and the language of their community.

Speech-language pathologists will find the following selected language assessment articles helpful as they incorporate a curriculum-based, descriptive, or dynamic assessment framework in their evaluation protocols. All of the articles are available at SERC’s library.

Descriptive Language Assessment
Selected References

Duchan, J.F. (2000). Assessing children’s language: Present, past, and future. Seminars in Speech and Language, 21(3), 189-192.

Duchan, J. F. (2002). Assessing socially situated participation: A way of integrating communication and social assessment approaches. Seminars in Speech and Language, 21(3), 205-213.

Gutierrez-Clellen, V.F. 2000). Dynamic assessment: An approach to assessing children’s language-learning potential. Seminars in Speech and Language, 21(3), 215-222.

Rollins, P.R., McCabe, A., & Bliss, L. (2002). Culturally sensitive assessment of narrative skills in children. Seminars in Speech and Language, 21(3), 223-234.

Watkins, R.V. & DeThorne, L.S. (2002). Assessing children’s vocabulary skills: From word knowledge to word-learning potential. Seminars in Speech and Language, 21(3), 235-245.

Paul, R. (2002). “Putting things in context”: Literal and discourse approaches to comprehension assessment. Seminars in Speech and Language, 21(3), 247-255.

Hewitt, L.E. (2000). Assessing communicative intents: A situated pragmatics approach. Seminars in Speech and Language, 21(3), 257-266.

Lund, N.J. (2002). Assessment of language structure: From syntax to event-based analysis. Seminars in Speech and Language, 21(3), 267-274.

Gillam, R.B., Pena, E.D., & Miller, L. (1999). Dynamic assessment of narrative and expository discourse. Topics in Language Disorders, 20(1), 33-47.

Merritt, D.D. & Culatta, B. (1998). Dynamic assessment, language processes, and curricular content. In D.D. Merritt and B. Culatta (Eds.), Language Intervention in the Classroom. SanDiego, CA: Singular.

Articles for Preventing School Failure

Senechal, M., LeFevre, J., Thoma, E.M., & Daley, K.E. (1998). Differential effects of home literacy experiences on the development of oral and written language. Reading Research Quarterly, 33, 96-116.

Hewitt, L., & Duchan, J. (1995). Subjectivity in children’s fictional narrative. Topics in Language Disorders, 15, 1-15.

McCabe, A., & Rollins, P.R. (1994). Assessment of preschool narrative skills: Prerequisites for literacy. American Journal of Speech-Language Pathology, 4, 45-56.

Champion, T., Seymour, H., & Camarata, S. (1995). Narrative discourse of African American children, 5, 333-352.

Crago, M., Eriks-Brophy, A. Pesco, D. & McAlpine, L. (1997). Culturally based miscommunication in classroom interaction. Language, Speech, and Hearing Services in Schools, 28, 245-253.

Bliss, L., Covington, Z., & McCabe, A. (1999). Assessing the narrative of African American children. Contemporary Issues in Communication Science Disorders, 25, 160-167.

McCabe, A. & Peterson, C. (1990). What makes a narrative memorable? Applied Psycholinguistics, 8, 73-82.

Miranda, A., McCabe, A., & Bliss, L. (1998). Jumping around and leaving things out: Dependency analysis applied to the narratives of children with specific language impairment. Applied Psycholinguistics, 19, 657-668.

Bliss, L., McCabe, A., & Miranda, A. (1998). Narrative assessment profile: Discourse analysis for school age children. Journal of Communication Disorders, 11, 1-17.

Peterson, C., Jesso, B. & McCabe, A. (1999). Encouraging narratives in preschoolers: An intervention study. Journal of Child Language, 26, 49-67.

Watkins, R.V., Kelly, D.J., Harbers, H.M., & Hollis, W. (1995). Measuring children’s lexical diersity: Differentiating typical and atypical language learners. Journal of Speech and Hearing Research, 38, 1349-1355.

Washington, J. & Craig, H. (1999). Performances of at-risk, African-American preschoolers on the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test – III. Language, Speech, and Hearing Services in Schools, 30, 75-82.

McCabe, A. (1992). Language Games to Play with Your Child (rev. ed.). New York: Insight/Plenum.

For more information, please contact:
SERC Consultants: Ruth D. Kirsch, LCSW, Ph.D., (860) 632-1485 (ext. 364) or Donna D. Merritt, Ph.D., CCC, ext. (337)