Assessing Speech Sound Disorders in School-Age Children From Diverse Language Backgrounds: A Tutorial With Three Case Studies

Abstract

Purpose Assessing speech sound disorders (SSDs) in children from multilingual backgrounds requires synthesis of language- and dialect-specific information to arrive at a more accurate diagnosis. We present three case studies of school-age children with unique linguistic profiles to aid speech-language pathologists in assessing this diverse population. Our aim is to offer feasible strategies for speech-language pathologists who do not speak the student's language(s). Method Three multilingual school-age children with suspected SSD were assessed as part of an initial evaluation at a suburban school district. Children spoke Vietnamese–English, Japanese–Polish–English, and Tamil–English. Students' languages were considered in the entire assessment process (i.e., interview, test selection, data analysis, and clinical decision making), and appropriate measures and resources were chosen to understand word-level and spontaneous articulation, phonological awareness, and language skills. A contrastive analysis was used to determine the presence of an SSD. Conclusions Although all students presented with patterns attributable to transfer processes (e.g., nonmainstream vowel productions) and/or dialectal differences, only one of the three students presented with an SSD. Together, these cases underscore the importance of a comprehensive assessment for multilingual children.