WSHA member Dr. Melissa Allen

Speech/Language-Language. Research (Aram, Morris & Hall, 1993; Gilliam & Gilliam, 2006) supports using clinical judgment as an evidence-based practice for determining eligibility. Additionally, norm-referenced assessments do not take into account context and language usage. In regards to context, most norm-referenced measures require no words (investigating comprehension) or few words. Children with typically developing language speak using sentences. You may have a child who provides a target in an appropriate one-word response, but fails to use the target in a larger linguistic context (i.e., a sentence). In addition, children use language to get what they need and to share information. Norm-referenced tests do not investigate the difference between child-adult and child-child interactions nor do they consider the settings in which they occur. The lack of reliable and valid norm-referenced measures of pragmatics (language usage) eliminates the identification a group of language-disabled students because there are no-norm referenced tools available to use to apply the eligibility criteria. The lack of norm-referenced measures of pragmatics (language use) was emphasized. How can the criteria be applied if there is an area of disability that does not have a valid measure to assess it? The valid measures include language sampling and observations.

I do have one additional comment in response to a remark that Carol Hvidston made during the conference call on 10/13/2009. Carol stated that only the speech-language section had included the need for clinician judgment when the other areas did not. She followed that remark with a second stating that there is an assumption that clinical judgment is assumed. I would make the argument that the suggested eligibility criteria for Autism, Cognitive disability, Emotional disability, Orthopedic impairment, Other health impaired, and Learning disability have an observation component. I see how Carol can make the statement that clinical judgment is assumed since there is an observation component. Observation and all other measures have been removed from the suggested Speech-language AND Developmental delay eligibility criteria,. Due to this removal, the assumption that clinical judgment is assumed cannot be made. If the eligibility criteria are going to be aligned, then observations should be included for the speech-language and developmental delay criteria.

As an aside, the WDE Eligibility Criteria Side-by-Side Comparison form used the term standardized measures. It should be noted that standardized measures are not the same as norm-referenced measures. I can create and use standardized observation and criterion-referenced measures. The inclusion of 1.5 standard deviations below the mean implies that a norm-referenced measure is being used, but it does not guarantee this. I can create a mean and standard deviation for a standardized observation.

Thank you for considering these comments.

Sincerely,

Melissa M. Allen, Ph.D., CCC-SLP

Assistant Professor of Speech-Language Pathology
Division of Communication Disorders
(307) 766-6098
mallen20@uwyo.edu