Watching for the Little Things

Published in the August 2024 issue of the ISHA Voice.

By Laurel Teller, a member of the Evidence-based Practice Committee

Inspirational quotations about the importance of the little things abound and as speech-language pathologists, we should watch out for the little things – the little errors in children’s speaking, writing, and reading. Errors in past tense are one of those little things that is not so little.

A long line of research with preschool and school-age children has demonstrated that errors in tense marking in spoken language are a tell-tale sign, that is a clinical marker, of language impairment (e.g., Rice & Wexler, 1996; Rice et al., 1998). In this article we will explore some small tidbits from this long line of research, specifically related to past tense errors. But first, let’s get to know Caroline. Caroline is a speech-language pathologist who works in a public school with children from preschool through fifth grade. She has noted that many children on her caseload make errors in past tense. These errors are evident across development and across modalities (e.g., speaking, writing, reading). Caroline has decided to review the literature related to this topic.

Speaking

Owen is five and a half years old and has just started kindergarten. He is one of the children on Caroline’s caseload and receives speech-language services under the educational disability category of language impairment. One of his goals is to increase his accuracy of past tense in his spoken language. Caroline discovered that the Test of Early Grammatical Impairment (TEGI; Rice & Wexler, 2001), available free of charge at https://kuscholarworks.ku.edu/handle/1808/32569, provides a way to probe Owen’s production of past tense in regular and irregular verbs as well as other important grammatical structures. Caroline found that the TEGI past tense probe had good sensitivity and specificity as a screening measure for kindergarteners with suspected language impairment (Weiler et al., 2018).

During the administration of the TEGI past tense probe, Caroline described one picture in present tense (e.g., Here the boy is raking). She then pointed to a second picture that showed a completed action and asked Owen what the person in the picture did (e.g., He raked the leaves). In response to these prompts Owen produced past tense with 45% accuracy, which was below the expected criterion score of 79% accuracy. This criterion score is the percent accuracy that was determined to best differentiate children with and without language impairment at his age. As Caroline continued to search the literature, she found multiple studies that demonstrated that past tense is an area of vulnerability for children with language impairment. She discovered that preschoolers and kindergarteners with language impairment make errors in past tense -ed in their spoken language more frequently than children with typical language (e.g., Rice & Wexler, 1996; Rice et al. 1998). She also learned that children with language impairment who are English language learners (ELLs) or who speak African American English (AAE) mark past tense less frequently than children with typical language who are ELLs or who speak AAE (Blom & Paradis, 2013; Oetting et al., 2019).

Caroline is glad that she has chosen to target Owen’s past tense production because she recognizes that past tense is not only helpful in identifying children with language impairment but also serves as a functional intervention target (Weiler et al., 2018).

Additionally, Caroline learned that the accuracy of past tense -ed in the spoken language of children with language impairment improves over time; by 9 years old, the average accuracy is at approximately 90% or higher (Rice et al., 2004; Rice et al., 1998). Although past tense -ed production in spoken language improves, errors in past tense do not disappear. Rather they change form.

Writing

Robert is nine years old and in the third grade. He has received speech-language services since kindergarten. His teacher reports that he is now having difficulty with writing. Caroline knows that writing requires many skills, including spelling, vocabulary knowledge, organization, and grammatical accuracy. She decided to administer the Story Composition subtest from the Test of Written Language – Fourth Edition (Hammill & Larsen, 2009) to evaluate Robert’s writing. Robert had several grammatical errors in his writing including errors in past tense.

When Caroline reviewed the literature, she discovered that children with language impairment continue to demonstrate errors in past tense in writing even after they have mastered past tense in spoken language (e.g., Brimo et al., 2023; Rice et al., 2004; Windsor et al., 2000). For example, Brimo et al. (2023) found that school-age children with language impairment wrote past tense (regular and irregular verbs combined) in simple sentences with lower accuracy than children with typical language.

Reading

Lindsey is also nine years old and in the third grade. She does not receive speech-language services, but her teacher is concerned about her language and literacy skills. Lindsey’s teacher has had multiple conversations with Caroline about Lindsey and recently told her that Lindsey is having difficulty with reading fluency. When Caroline listened to Lindsey read, she realized that Lindsey frequently omits past tense -ed in her oral reading. She wondered if there was a connection between omissions of past tense -ed in oral reading and spoken language. She found a study that demonstrated that second and third grade children with language impairment were more likely to produce past tense -ed errors in oral reading than their peers with typical language (Werfel et al., 2017). Caroline realizes that these omissions alongside the teacher’s other concerns support further evaluation of Lindsey’s language skills.

Caroline’s review of the literature helped her to learn about the importance of looking for past tense errors not only in spoken language but also in writing and reading as part of her evaluation of children with language impairment. She also learned about the TEGI as a tool to assess past tense and other grammatical structures. Caroline will continue to build on this knowledge as she reads the literature and considers the BIG little things in children’s language and literacy skills. 

References

Blom, E., & Paradis, J. (2013). Past tense production by English second language learners with and without language impairment. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 56(1), 281-294. https://doi.org/10.1044/1092-4388(2012/11-0112)

Brimo, D., Nallamala, K., & Werfel, K. L. (2023). Writing errors of children with developmental language disorder. Topics in Language Disorders, 43(4), 302-316. https://doi.org/10.1097/TLD.0000000000000326

Hammill, D. D., & Larsen, S. C. (2009). Test of Written Language–Fourth edition. Pro-Ed.

Oetting, J. B., Berry, J. R., Gregory, K. D., Rivière, A. M., & McDonald, J. (2019). Specific language impairment in African American English and Southern White English: Measures of tense and agreement with dialect-informed probes and strategic scoring. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 62(9), 3443-3461. https://doi.org/10.1044/2019_JSLHR-L-19-0089

Rice, M. L., Tomblin, J. B., Hoffman, L., Richman, W. A., & Marquis, J. (2004). Grammatical tense deficits in children with SLI and nonspecific language impairment. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 47(4), 816-834. https://doi.org/10.1044/1092-4388(2004/061)

Rice, M. L., & Wexler, K. (2001). Rice/Wexler Test of Early Grammatical Impairment. The Psychological Corporation.

Rice, M. L., & Wexler, K. (1996). Toward tense as a clinical marker of specific language impairment in English-speaking children. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 39(6), 1239-1257. https://doi.org/10.1044/jshr.3906.1239

Rice, M. L., Wexler, K., & Hershberger, S. (1998). Tense over time: The longitudinal course of tense acquisition in children with specific language impairment. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 41(6), 1412-1431. https://doi.org/10.1044/jslhr.4106.1412

Weiler, B., Schuele, C. M., Feldman, J. I., & Krimm, H. (2018). A multiyear population-based study of kindergarten language screening failure rates using the Rice Wexler Test of Early Grammatical Impairment. Language, Speech, and Hearing Services in Schools, 49(2), 248-259. https://doi.org/10.1044/2017_LSHSS-17-0071

Werfel, K. L., Hendricks, A. E., & Schuele, C. M. (2017). The potential of past tense marking in oral reading as a clinical marker of specific language impairment in school-age children. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 60(12), 3561-3572. https://doi.org/10.1044/2017_JSLHR-L-17-0115

Windsor, J., Scott, C. M., & Street, C. K. (2000). Verb and noun morphology in the spoken and written language of children with language learning disabilities. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 43(6), 1322-1336. https://doi.org/10.1044/jslhr.4306.1322

Laurel Teller is an assistant professor in the Communication Disorders and Sciences Department at Eastern Illinois University. Her areas of interest include child language and literacy and multilingual development, assessment, and intervention.