Page 83 - Literacy Based Speech Language Therapy Activities Digital Version

Assessing What to Work on, Choosing Goals, and Taking Data

Detailed case study and example of language sampling

Let’s take a look at a 7-year-old student who qualifies for language therapy. We gathered language
samples from conversation, story-telling without an example, and story-telling after he heard an
example. He is bilingual so we gathered samples in both languages. What you see below is way more

work than you will need to do for children who have already qualified. We wanted to illustrate how
much linguistically-rich information that we can gather in a short amount of time.

Josepi, Age 7;2 Qualified for Speech Services with an Expressive and Receptive Impairment

Conversational Language Sample
Informal observations indicated that Josepi’s conversational language skills are stronger in Spanish

than English. The examiner asked Josepi about what he does at home and who he plays with, and
what he received as a gift on a recent holiday. He was able to give basic information in response to
“Wh” questions (e.g., who, what, where) but his utterances were limited grammatically.

I have it the move it robot yellow. This[what did your brothers and sisters get?]My
boy little have it the RRRRRRR (driving)
I opened the present the robot.
My big boy has it the the this one 9drawing)
Press the body button
Have it the down up (out of chair marching?)
Now the move (marching in room)
[did you have a Christmas tree”]
[what else did you get?]
Green tree have it green tree beautiful
My naneraThe hobbitThe man
[do you have a dog?] No, no have it.
De de de de happ out here

Story-telling Exercise (TELL & RETELL)
Josepi was asked to tell a story after looking at pictures in a wordless picture book. An example of
Josepi’s stories in English are presented here, followed by an explanation:

English storytelling without an example The where the frog coming for?

Right here the boy the dog the frog Frog, are you here?

The boy the sleeping. No.

Here. Frog, were are you?

The (hi) him boy. Woof woof woof.

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