Is your child struggling with vocabulary in comprehension and writing in school?

Does your child have trouble expressing himself or herself in school using the correct vocabulary?

Do you have difficulty in understanding what your child wants because he or she does not know the right vocabulary to use?

Does he or she have limited vocabulary and struggle to learning new vocabulary in comprehension and writing?

Your child may be suffering from Speech Language Impairment (SLI)

What is Speech Language Impairment? 
SLI is not caused by low IQ, sensory issues such as hearing impairment, or other conditions such as autism (ASD). It is not the same as dyslexia which is a specific difficulty in learning to read.

SLI is one of the most common learning disabilities, occurring in 7% of children. (compared to stuttering or ASD which only affect about 1% of the population.)
Children with SLI have impaired language skills in these areas:

• Shorter sentence structure- equivalent up to a 2 year delay

• Even poorer grammar skills relative to vocabulary and sentence structures, equivalent to more than a 2 year delay.

• Limited Vocabulary equivalent to a 2 year delay. e.g a Primary 3 child may have the
  vocabulary of a Primary 1 child.

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p class=”Normal”>Why is Vocabulary so Important?

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Vocabulary is considered to be one of the important pillars of speech. Having good vocabulary is often taken to be an indicator of the standard of one’s language skills. With insufficient vocabulary, your child may not be able to express his desires and emotions fluently, leading to communication difficulties or social skill difficulties.
In addition, good vocabulary is needed in order to understand comprehension passages in school.
Research shows that typically, children and adults are very capable in learning new words everyday, and are able to take in about seven new vocabulary on average.

According to the latest research published in February 2015, children with Specific Language Impairment (SLI) need 2-3 times more exposure in learning a new word compared to other children. Thus, in order to learn 10 new words, a SLI child needs 20-30 times more exposure to the new words than other children.
Without intervention or speech and language therapy, a SLI child will face increasing difficulty in attaining new vocabulary, resulting in the the child not being to communicate fluently.

Without an adequate vocabulary bank, children may face limited education opportunities and employment prospects in the future.