ModelEval- 3.4-BilingualEnglishCantonese-TypicallyDeveloping.pdf
EL was a monolingual Cantonese speaker who has only recently been exposed to English through an older brother in kindergarten and starting preschool. Although EL was shy during the evaluation, the evaluators were able to get an accurate demonstration of EL’s language skills through videos recorded by Mom on her cell phone. It was determine that EL’s language skills were within normal limits.
Background History:
EL is a Cantonese-speaking female with emerging English skills. EL has an elder brother who is 2 years and 5 months older than her. EL was born in Hong Kong, China. When EL was 2 years and 2 months old, she came to the US with her parents and her elder brother. The family currently resides in Westchester County, New York.
Both of EL’s parents finished their bachelor degrees in Hong Kong. Her mother is now pursuing a Master’s degree at Teachers college, Columbia University.
When EL was in Hong Kong, EL’s mother was the primary caregiver. However, after EL’s family moved to the US, EL’s father became the primary caregiver of EL and her brother at home due to EL’s mother’s full-time student status. According to the mother, she has not had any concerns about EL regarding the change of primary caregiver and international relocation.
At home, EL played with her 5 years and 9 months old brother most of the time. Before her brother attended kindergarten in New York, the conversation between EL and her brother was completely in Cantonese. However, since EL’s brother started kindergarten in September, 2014, using partial English vocabulary was observed in his conversation with EL. EL watched cartoons in English on TV for about 10 minutes at home everyday. Her parents read bedtime stories to EL and her brother either in Cantonese or English every night. When they read stories in English, EL showed strong curiosity by frequently asking, “What does it mean” in Cantonese.
EL started preschool, where English is the primary language, on September 17th, 2014. She goes to school 3 days per week and 2.5 hours each day. Mother reported that EL was able to follow instructions in class, answer yes/no questions, label fruits, animals, and colors, count to 10 by rote in English, and sing the alphabet song. EL also engaged in various activities and enjoyed playing with her peers at school. However, EL has not spoken to her peers yet. The teacher reported to EL’s mother that EL requested to go to the bathroom by uttering the English word bathroom one day at school. EL’s mother observed that EL started using two-word phrases in English (e.g. “play together”, “do not”) at home.
According to her mother, all of EL’s speech and language developmental milestones were within normal limits in Cantonese. There was no family history of learning or speech delay. EL started speaking two-syllable words (e.g. 花花/flower, 车车/car) at 12 months of age and simple sentences at 20 months of age (e.g. 这个很好吃/This tastes good) in Cantonese.
Language Background and Use:
Cantonese is the primary language spoken at home. Due to the lack of English exposure, EL demonstrated very minimal skills in English. Properly speaking, EL is essentially a monolingual Cantonese-speaking girl. When EL’s parents speak Cantonese to each other, they sometimes demonstrate the use of code switching between English and Cantonese. Since the beginning of kindergarten in September, 2014, EL’s brother used some English words in his utterances at home when he communicated with EL. For the past three weeks, EL was in an English-only-speaking class.
Hearing:
According to the mother, EL’s hearing was evaluated during the hearing screening test at EL’s preschool in the beginning of September, 2014. The results indicated that EL had grossly appropriate hearing. Her hearing is within normal limits.
Oral Peripheral Mechanism and Feeding:
EL’s face was symmetrical at rest. According to the mother, EL did not have any eating problems or swallowing issues. During the evaluation, EL was observed to chew biscuits and drink water. She demonstrated proper control of oral secretions and swallowing ability.
Cursory inspection of the oral structures and oral-motor mechanism indicated that EL’s oral structures are intact and demonstrated adequate strength and skills to perform basic oral tasks.
Fluency and Voice:
EL’s fluency was considered appropriate for her age and gender. EL’s voice appeared to be raspy. According to her mother’s report, EL cried at least about 10 minutes everyday. When she cried, she usually made a considerably loud sound. Therefore, EL’s vocal quality had been harsh since she started talking. EL’s parents had noticed the raspy quality of EL’s voice. However, EL had never seen any speech-language specialist, ENT doctor, or voice specialist to address this voice concern either in Hong Kong or the US.
Articulation and Intelligibility:
EL’s articulation was unremarkable, as her speech was intelligible to familiar and unfamiliar listeners.
Language:
Assessment Materials:
- Bus Stop Picture
- Bunny Visit School
- Subway Picture with Shoe Caught in Door
- EL’s family video recordings
- Parent interview
- Clinical Practice Guideline: Report of the Recommendations. Communication Disorders, NYSDOH Assessment and Intervention for Young Children (Age 0-3 Years)
Receptive Language
EL attended well to what the evaluators said both to her and her mother. EL understood age-appropriate wh– questions (where, who, what, when) and yes/no questions by responding to questions in phrases or simple sentences. For example, “Who are in the video?” “What were you playing with your brother?” “Where were you playing?” “Did your brother help you to build the boat?”
EL was able to follow two-step directions by pointing to the characters in the bus stop picture. For example, “First show me the girl eating chips then point to the boy reading a book.” “Point to the two boys with back packs then point to the two girls sitting down.” “Point to the boy with the headphones then point to the boy with glasses.”
EL understood age-appropriate statements. For example, the evaluator commented on EL’s pink shirt with stars. Then the evaluator asked EL to pick a dress with stars after giving her three choices. EL attended to the evaluator carefully and made the choice accurately. EL also attended well to the narrative presented by an evaluator regarding the doggie’s (stuffed animal) leg being stuck at the door by laughing.
The mother said that EL’s language comprehension skills were appropriate for her age compared to peers. Based on the assessment materials administered during the evaluation and the evaluators’ clinical judgments, EL’s receptive language ability was within normal limits.
Expressive Language:
In the first half of the evaluation, EL appeared very shy. EL sat on her mother’s lap for the whole evaluation. EL always hid her head into her mother’s arms when the evaluators tried to talk to her. Because of her reaction to unfamiliar people and setting, EL’s expressive speech output appeared to be limited. EL’s mother reported that EL’s expressive language skills in the evaluation were not representative for her. EL spoke much more at home.
EL was very interested in watching her family videos on her mother’s cell phone. The evaluators elicited most of EL’s verbal responses by asking questions while she was watching her family videos. EL responded to most questions with three- to six-character utterances during the evaluation (e.g. “在玩火车/Playing the train”). While we were watching the videos together, EL asked her mother, “哥哥在做什么?/What was the brother doing?”. Her mother replied, “What do you think your brother is doing?” EL answered, “扔雪球/Throwing snowballs.” When we watched another video in which EL’s family were visiting a waterfall, EL laughed loudly and asked her mom, “水为什么这样?/ Why does the water like this?” Her mother asked the same question back to EL. EL thought about it and responded, “水掉下来/ The water is running down (referring to the waterfall).”
In the family videos, EL also demonstrated more complex and longer utterances (more than six- character sentences). For example, “我睡觉穿这个(尿)片好不好?/Is it good for me to wear this dipper to sleep?” “妈妈照完相了, 去别的地方玩/Mom, (we) finished taking pictures. (And let’s) go to another place to play.” “我够十六岁可以开(车)/I’m 16 years old (so) I can drive.”
Play Skills
EL’s age-appropriate play skills were observed in three events. One was the play of wooden magnetic dress-up doll between EL and one of the evaluators during the assessment. After EL put the pants and the boots together, she saw that they did not fit on the wooden doll. Then she replaced the boots with a pair of sneakers. The other two events were pretend play (e.g. cooking and driving a bus) between EL and her brother shown in the family videos on EL’s mother’s cell phone. During pretend play, EL “cooked” the food on the stove. In the video, when EL’s mother asked her what she was doing, she answered “正在煮东西/(I am) cooking food.” In another video, EL and her brother were pretending driving a bus with a box. While EL’s brother was pulling the box for her, she pretended to put her hands on a steering wheel and said that she was 16 years old so she could drive.
A narrative language sample could not be collected due to EL’s shyness and unestablished rapport between the clinicians and EL. EL refused to talk and hid herself from the evaluators most of the time when she was asked questions. At the end of the evaluation, EL appeared to be tired and wanted to leave. She asked her mother, “可以走了吗?/Can (we) go?” She waved and said “Bye-Bye” to the evaluators as she left the room.
** Please note that omission of subjects in sentences is acceptable in Spoken Cantonese.
CONCLUSIONS
As a result of an unfamiliar setting, shyness, and unestablished rapport between the clinicians and EL, EL did not perform the full spectrum of her expressive language skills during the assessment session. However, language samples obtained from family videos showed on EL’s mother’s cell phone offer adequate demonstrations, arguments, and confirmation to exemplify EL’s normal expressive language skills. Based on the assessment materials administered and informed clinical opinion as well as EL’s family’s judgment compared to peers, EL demonstrated age-appropriate skills in all areas of speech and language development.
RECOMMENDATIONS
It is recommended that EL attends a voice screening in the voice clinic. No other speech-language services are recommended for EL.
Thank you to Teachers College graduate students Tara Lai and Mo Li.
